Quote:
Originally Posted by Delgar
MBates,
I agree with the above, its clear the Crown conceded even before the opening statements.
I also found it odd how the press reported on the defence counsel being "near to tears", not to say anything bad about him, but it just doesn't sit right that the lead story one day is the defence lawyer was near crying.
However, the Crown hires three experts and they all come back with consistent (though not the same) diagnoses. And we know the Crown is obligated to seek the truth, not to seek a conviction.
So what is the Crown to do here? I presume you're going to say, cross-examine the hell out of those experts, but you still need the back-up of at least one expert to provide an alternative diagnosis, don't you? Should the Crown have gone shopping for an out country expert? Doesn't that look bad by itself?
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Actually, I think what I would say is the Crown perhaps ought to have informed the judge in its opening statement that it would be proving five murders that were committed by a person who was NCR.
Remove any appearance that this was a show trial and simply present up front that, while it would be ultimately up to him to decide if he accepted or rejected the defence, the Crown was essentially joining the accused in presenting the evidence.
I mean, as near as I can tell that is actually what they did anyway...so why not just say so?
And strictly speaking, every accused is presumed not to be NCR and the burden of proof is on the defence so as Crown you could technically not have any contrary expert opinion (though practically speaking you would need something to counter 3 independent experts).