Jian Ghomeshi got away with it
The CBC reports (on its former employee):
Jian Ghomeshi has been acquitted on four counts of sexual assault and one count of choking by an Ontario Court judge who says the “deceptive and manipulative” evidence of the complainants raised a reasonable doubt in the guilt of the former CBC Radio host.
In a searing rebuke of the complainants, Judge William Horkins said the evidence from all three not only suffered from inconsistencies, but was “tainted by outright deception.”
“The harsh reality is that once a witness has been shown to be deceptive and manipulative in giving their evidence, that witness can no longer expect the court to consider them to be a trusted source of the truth,” Horkins said.
That will encourage more women to report rapes. Not.
A very sorry affair.
The judge is not saying that these events did not occur – Gomeshi’s lawyers admitted that many did – simply that the Crown (i.e. the government) did not make a strong enough case that there was no consent. And this is mainly due to the unreliable witnesses. Their testimonies were a mess. There’s one more case against Gomeshi coming up in June. Let’s hope that one gets it right.
http://news.nationalpost.com/full-comment/robyn-urback-based-on-the-evidence-not-guilty-was-the-only-possible-outcome-for-ghomeshi
http://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorials/2016/03/24/jian-ghomeshi-trial-sparked-welcome-soul-searching-about-sexual-violence-editorial.html
Heard a phone-in about this on the Ottawa CBC station today. The guest was a defence lawyer (Anne London-Weinstein) who said that she had to agree that it was unfortunately true that the testimony of the witnesses was not sufficient, and that though they were not to blame for this, the witnesses did make mistakes in how they dealt with the police – e.g. how they handled the information about their relationship with Ghomeshi. (Which of course they did in an attempt to avoid having their sexual history paraded before the court.) Also the point was made that JG has not been found innocent, there was just not sufficient evidence to find him “guilty beyond all reasonable doubt”. General consensus was that the court system is inadequate to justly deal with sexual assault cases (though there was one caller who called for “true equality”, decrying the “abuse of privilege” that resulted in the destruction of an innocent man’s career).
I do not understand how it is possible to believe the women were telling the truth and consider the court to be doing the right thing in labeling them manipulative and deceptive.
What if it was a different kind of crime?
“So, you accuse this man of robbing you?”
“Yes.”
“Well, we can see that you withdrew money from your ATM on the day in question, and he ended up with it, and he admits he threatened you if you didn’t withdraw the money and hand it over to him and choked you.”
“That’s correct.”
“But when you reported the theft, you didn’t talk about your previous business relationship with the defendant.”
“I didn’t want them to think this was a business transaction. It wasn’t. It was a theft. I didn’t consent and he had me in a chokehold.”
“Maybe you like paying people to choke you.”
“WHAT?!”
“You were obviously trying to trick everyone, otherwise, you’d mention you’ve given him money before.”
“For gardening services, not for choking me.”
“Some people have a kink.”
“I’m not the one on trial.”
“I suggest that filing a false police report is a crime, so perhaps you should be.”
@3,
The issue was consent.
From the Toronto Star’s editorial:
I thought it was a slam dunk case before it went to court. But these witnesses were terrible. Some of their behaviour can be explained by what often happens in situations of abuse, but other instances, long after their relationships with him ended, can only be described as manipulative. They not only ruined their own case, they probably provided the misogynists with a great confirmation of their prejudices.
I can only hope the Crown’s case coming up in June is seriously vetted.
I think the problem is that the *right thing* is not necessarily the thing that one gets to by following the rule of law. In other words, in many cases (and apparently in this one), “the law is an ass”. I was listening to an interview with one of the witnesses, in which she said that her testimony changed because she kept remembering more about what happened, and that she was not expecting that the judge would fail to understand “how memory works”. The accusation of “manipulation and deception” confirms that.
I can’t understand why these women continued to correspond with and to even have sex with Ghomeshi after the incidents took place. How could a court have convicted the guy in light of that?
@John, #6
see http://www.butterfliesandwheels.org/2016/guest-post-abuse-isnt-actually-a-reaction-to-the-other-person/
and http://www.butterfliesandwheels.org/2016/she-had-been-brought-up-to-make-the-people-around-her-happy-and-comfortable/
@7
Completely agree with those articles. Ghomeshi IS guilty, but the justice system’s *mechanics* cannot broker those types of psychological arguments. Women, or at least many of them, are most certainly conditioned to please and to be accommodating, polite, passive, consensus-building etc, however that kind of argument doesn’t hold much water when it comes to convicting someone of a sexual aggression.
The fact they continued to communicate with the guy, and the implications/suggestions such correspondence raises were what got Ghomeshi off the hook.
Our legal system’s judicial ‘logic’ is generally oriented to the psychology of males. A ( hetero) male would never have done what these women did after having been sexually assaulted by another ( hetero) male.
I’m having difficulty explaining what I mean…
The abuse of power and position, the willful obliviousness of witnesses and employers, the pathological passivity and ‘niceness’ of the victims.
All of it so close to ‘normal’ dating. Perhaps male witnesses don’t recognize that Ghomeshi is a different animal from themselves. Every woman knows the deep fear when the monster shows his real face.
On the other hand, a hetero male sexually assaulted by a woman might very well have done something similar.