Quote:
Originally Posted by jayswin
Oh, well I'll defer to you as I believe you have a legal background. So it's standard for police to get a complaint and basically just lay a charge and let the courts deal with it?
And I guess my follow up would be; If that's the case, then what's going on with this investigation? They seem to be doing a lot more than you suggest they're supposed to.
And also, that last sentence is a little concerning, as it suggests somebody should be charged as soon as anyone makes a complaint?
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The decision to charge is sometimes made by police, sometimes by the prosecutor (sometimes by police after consulting a prosecutor or their own in-house counsel). The Canadian standard for a charge simply is whether there are reasonable grounds to believe an offence was committed by the accused.
That said the police are sworn officers of the law just as much as a lawyer or judge and they ought to be using their training and experience to filter out cases that are not worthy of proceeding.
For example, would we want a highly skilled detective with 30 years of experience and a team of other officers / analysts / profilers / etc. automatically submitting every complaint for charges regardless of the evidence for a first year prosecutor to make that call? For a first-year judge to decide after trial?
The system is human from the first to the last step, so potential for human error never goes away. Anyone willing to say any allegation should be decided by a jury has clearly never made the walk to the courtroom after getting called and informed a verdict is in...
At the prosecution stage in Canada the test is more strict than having reasonable grounds...the prosecutor will assess (1) whether there is a reasonable likelihood of conviction and (2) whether there it is in the public interest to proceed. Without both of those being present, the charge should be withdrawn.
Most developed countries will have some variant of this test.
Even an acquittal at trial does not equate to a finding of factual innocence so not proceeding with a charge can hardly equate with a conclusion that the complainant made it up.
What is happening with this particular case? Impossible to say really. I do not agree with an earlier post suggesting the longer it goes on the worse it is for Kane. It might mean that...or it might mean the opposite.
One factor likely is, however, that in many US state penal codes criminal charges must be brought to trial within very short time periods from of an indictment. Of course exceptions exist, but the US seems to take much more seriously the obligation to quickly either convict or clear someone after they are charged.
Timelines for the people to be ready for trial in New York appear to be only 6 months for felonies:
http://codes.lp.findlaw.com/nycode/CPL/ONE/C/30/30.30