Quote:
Originally Posted by llwhiteoutll
And this is the exact way it is supposed to, and should, work. The Crown must prove their case beyond a reasobable doubt, it is no incumbent on the accused to provide evidence supporting their innocence. In this case, the jury clearly felt that the Crown presented no evidence supporting their charges.
The way you are talking, it sounds like you would be fine if the accused in trials were forced to prove their innocence.
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In this situation the defendant must absolutely provide evidence to support his claims in order to be successful. If you're caught on video shooting someone in the head, do you honestly think there's no burden on you to provide evidence to prove your innocence if you expect to successfully defend yourself? Of course there is, and that has nothing to do with the overall notion of innocent until proven guilty.
Stanley readily admitted that the gun he was holding killed Boushie which is admitting to at least manslaughter barring exceptional circumstances. So the onus was on him to provide evidence that he was not responsible for the crime he admitted to if he wanted to be successful. I guess for the jury (and a lot of other people) him just saying it was an accident with virtually no physical evidence to support his claims was enough to introduce reasonable doubt. It certainly isn't enough in my mind though. I mean, what else is he going to say?