Jian Ghomeshi: Guilty or Innocent?

[Kjesse]

Originally Posted by Johnny199r

No way in Hell the crown pursues perjury charges. What a firestorm that would be.

Witnesses commit perjury a lot more than you expect, especially a defendant.

The defendant goes to jail if they're disbelieved. Have you seen an instance where, in a written decision, the judge states a Crown witness perjured themselves, but it wasn't pursued?

I agree it would be a firestorm, but how do you let this go? Doesn't the AG have a duty to prosecute perjury when it has been presented in such clear terms?

[troutman]

Originally Posted by Delgar

Note how most of the posters on this board (including me) think he's a creep because we all think there are so many accusers their allegations must be true....

By one count, 23 separate allegations . . .

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2014/11...n_6136136.html

[Savvy27]

I doubt the Crown would pursue it. I don't get the impression at all that the judge believes that the accuser's lied about the actual incident. Lucy lied about post-incident behavior, which I think can fairly be chalked up to trying to make her behavior seem more reasonable. For me, that is a very human and understandable reaction.

If there was evidence that the accuser's had never even been alone with Ghomeshi in their lives and they were still up there accusing him, that would be a different story.

[Huntingwhale]

Originally Posted by troutman

a topless protester stormed the podium while the crown was responding to the decision. She was handcuffed and led into a police cruiser.

NSFW!

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by peter12

He has, and will continue to pay an enormous social price for his purported actions.

If no accusers had come forward, and we had no court case, but the allegations from CBC and his weird Facebook confession was all that existed, I still think this guy would be toxic and no one would want to hire him, and he would be given a wide berth at any swanky parties he went to.

[bigtmac19]

http://www.thesocial.ca/video?vid=831058
Very interesting discussion at the beginning of The Social today regarding the verdict and comments made by the Judge. It's about the first 5-7 minutes of the show.

[Northendzone]

I don't understand the purpose of the topless protest.

[T@T]

Pat Kane was more guilty that this guy, and apparently he was innocent.

[Itse]

Originally Posted by CaptainYooh

I agree with the general tone of this post. I disagree with labeling though. We don't know if he's a scum-bag. He certainly LOOKS like a scum-bag in light of accusations and media portrayal and it feels like he could be one. But the general public doesn't know if he is or not. Therefore, to label him as a scum bag is presumptuous, libelous and unwarranted.

It's also worth noting that being an enormous scum-bag and a terrible person is not in itself a crime. Being a date from hell does not in itself mean a person is a criminal.

Ghomeshi being that hated by several of his ex's is to me a pretty sure sign that he is a scum-bag, but in my eyes it's possible that he didn't actually break laws to an extent that he deserved to go to jail. (For one, because not all crimes lead to jail sentences.)

(Personally I have no opinion on the matter.)

[CliffFletcher]

Originally Posted by bigtmac19

http://www.thesocial.ca/video?vid=831058
Very interesting discussion at the beginning of The Social today regarding the verdict and comments made by the Judge. It's about the first 5-7 minutes of the show.

I guess if by interesting you mean "breathtaking in its vapid and irrational analysis." Watching those hosts flail around making facile complaints while misunderstanding and expressing outright falsehoods about the decision makes me despair for humanity. All four utterly failed to understand the ruling, or how the justice system works.

* They criticize the ruling for bringing up the behaviour of the complainants after the alleged assaults. But the judge himself pointed out that it wasn't the behaviour itself that was at issue, but the fact the women all lied about their behaviour, which damaged their credibility.

* They expressed outrage that the judge said we need to be careful about the stereotype that accusers are always telling the truth, saying they've never heard of such a stereotype. Then later in the segment they laud the 'we believe' hashtag. What is the 'we believe' hashtag but a presumption that accusers always tell the truth?

* They complained that the accusers seemed to be punished for communicating with one another. It's baffling that none of them understood why that's a terrible idea.

* They said that if a bunch of people accuse someone of something, that's enough to establish that it's true. The audience cheered.

* At no point did anyone on the panel point out that the complainants lied to the police and courts.

If that's the kind of analysis we can expect of this ruling, I despair for our capability as a society to deal with these sorts of issues. This sounds elitist, but I sometimes wonder what fraction of Canadians have enough power of reason and clear thinking to even understand the principles underlying our justice system. It terrifies me to think of what kind of justice system we would have if it was altered to suit the intelligence and temperament of the kind of people on that show and mindlessly cheering in the audience.

[WhiteTiger]

Everyone loves the justice system if it does what they feel it should do. Everyone hates if it doesn't do what they feel it should have done.

It continues on, doing its thing, like it's supposed to.

A lot of the folks I'm seeing who are all "This is a travesty of justice!" are also the sort who are pretty fond of that meme which states: "I'd rather see 100 guilty men go free than 1 innocent man behind bars". Well...this is that meme in action, with the justice system that makes that meme work.

[Ducay]

It took a lot of restraint to not reply with text of the decision to a lot of my feminist friends on facebook that are up in arms about this ruling.

Its all the same crud you would expect from that clip of The Social. Blatant disregard or lack of understanding of how our criminal justice system operates at a basic level.

[FlamesAddiction]

I am not sure if it was mentioned, but he still has a trial starting in June for work place harassment, so legally he is not out of the woods yet.

[GGG]

From my read of the decision the judge despite the lying believed the complainants that an assault occurred just not to the standard of reasonable doubt. As soon as they lied on the stand, with no physical evidence in the case, the judge had to acquit.

The anger that people have should be directed at the poor job the prosecution did in ensuring the victims understood the nature of how the courts operated.

[GullFoss]

Lol at the social warrior justice clowns. Very poor understading of the policy or procedure; just there to make a scene. I bet a lot of these feminists didn't even bother getting an understanding of the justice system...they're stuck in their idiological world where the narrative is that men are ####, all women who make rape claims are victims, and the system is stacked against them.

[llwhiteoutll]

Originally Posted by GGG

From my read of the decision the judge despite the lying believed the complainants that an assault occurred just not to the standard of reasonable doubt. As soon as they lied on the stand, with no physical evidence in the case, the judge had to acquit.

The anger that people have should be directed at the poor job the prosecution did in ensuring the victims understood the nature of how the courts operated.

And a good potion of that anger should be directed at the complainants for torpedoing the entire case. The Crown doesn't get all the blame here, the way the court operates is dead simple.

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by llwhiteoutll

And a good potion of that anger should be directed at the complainants for torpedoing the entire case. The Crown doesn't get all the blame here, the way the court operates is dead simple.

Yeah, I mean when a complainant sends sexually suggestive emails to an alleged rapist after the attack, you have to question it. I know that victims often behave in unpredictable any irrational ways, but it's still not something you can ignore. Then the fact that they were collaborating to get their stories straight and an admission is court that they were trying to bait Ghomeshi by sending him sexual emails.

I am sure the Crown was facepalming a lot during this case.

Again, I personally think Ghomeshi likely did what he was accused of, but it was difficult to prove beyond a reasonable doubt.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by GullFoss

Lol at the social warrior justice clowns. Very poor understading of the policy or procedure; just there to make a scene. I bet a lot of these feminists didn't even bother getting an understanding of the justice system...they're stuck in their idiological world where the narrative is that men are ####, all women who make rape claims are victims, and the system is stacked against them.

Despite being a little dramatic and catty, I was with you until that last line.

The system IS stacked against sexual assault victims. That's a pretty legitimate grievance.

[Kjesse]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

The system IS stacked against sexual assault victims. That's a pretty legitimate grievance.

That's a pretty stacked statement on its own. The judgement itself explains why each witness' testimony was not adequate.

If you have an alternative, I'd like to hear it.

[GullFoss]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Despite being a little dramatic and catty, I was with you until that last line.

The system IS stacked against sexual assault victims. That's a pretty legitimate grievance.

Its not symetrical, and victims are given the short end of the stick...ill give you that. But id suggest (1) that its not stacked so much as is it tilted to be biased in favor of the accused and (2) its tilted against the victims of all crime, and is not actually specific to sexual assalt victims

And id suggest thats its purposely like that, largely driven by the reasonable doubt philosophy. Better to let 100 guilty men free than comdemn 1 falsely accused.