Posted on 07/09/2014 7:04:45 PM PDT by Morgana
Maybe the mother told the daughter about the mole.
After ten years? Why?
Just making the point that anything can be true. But anything can be false.
And my point is that the entire trial was not covered in the article and none of us knows what else was presented. Apparently enough to find the man guilty. I am having trouble with all the apologists on this thread! The article never said her essay was the only evidence.
I'm just not seeing justification for prosecution and people have been
prosecuted with less evidence for much worse, like Murder on false accusations.
One of the Jurors was also only 20-years old. No mention how old the others
were or the makeup of the jury.
Pretty big assumption given the crappy quality of what passes for “reporting” nowadays.
Look at his picture. Does he look like an innocent man or one consigned to his deserved fate. It says he was “mum.” If you were innocent would you be silent, or shout from the rooftops that you didn’t do it?
The article does mention some ‘facts’.
The daughter claims she ‘told no one’ until she wrote the essay. Nobody!
The mom claims she didn’t know until she read the essay.
There is no mention of DNA evidence.
The stepdad did not testify.
Looks like we have a miscarriage of justice here.
The ‘witch hunt’ has been going on since the 80’s.
That’s when the country learned how suggestible children are to heavy handed questioning.
If you want a conviction, bring proof and evidence.
And if you’re going to molest your daughter, just make sure she doesn’t have access to anything she can use to prove it later.
That is an excellent point. What an exceptionally keen eye you have.
I propose a new justice system.
Instead of trying people with evidence. We shall hire you to review their pictures.
I will send you the first hundred photos.
Just separate them into two piles. Innocent or guilty.
Thank you for your service.
This isn’t a molestation. The accusation is RAPE.
If you are a young girl and you get raped, you need to immediately go talk to someone.
Then, corrective actions can be taken.
Now? Ten years later .... All possible physical evidence long since gone...
Just post the photos on FR. Judging guilty or innocent is a sport here.
I don’t doubt the verdict. I don’t see where the stepdad objected very strongly. I do have a problem when convictions are handed down when it’s one word against the other with no physical evidence. And that does happen.
There probably was other evidence that was just not reported. The girl was applying to a Christian college; I would like to say that she wouldn't want to go to such a school if she were a liar. Maybe she always wanted to tell her mother but didn't know how, and this gave her a way.
Children who are abused sexually often are cowed or intimidated into keeping their mouths shut at the time. Yes, it may be “her word alone” at this point . . . but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. Her mother seemed to believe it, since she called the police herself after reading the essay. You could look at the mom’s action as someone trying to get revenge on a crappy ex-spouse . . . or the action of a woman who has finally seen the penny drop and all the pieces fall into place.
There "could be" all kinds of other evidence, such as photos and trophies kept by the purported rapist. Since I've been unable to find any discussion of such evidence, it seems unlikely there is any.
These are really, really tough cases.
Child molestation does occur. So do false accusations of child molestation.
So how do we determine the truth in situations where it is usually, though not always, "he said, she said?"
Sadly, in today's world the answer is that it depends on who tells the most convincing story in court. The problem with this is that some people are really, really good liars. Others aren't believable under stress even when telling the truth.
The whole issue has become politicized, with the presumption being that the female involved is telling the truth. Many conservatives jumped to this conclusion in the discussion about H. Clinton's defense of an accused child rapist in Arkansas.
We saw similar politicization of a similar issue during the "Satanic rape child care" moral panic of the 80s. A good many innocent people went to jail, some I believe only recently released, because activists demanded we, "Believe the children!"
Why? Children make things up all the time. They can be remarkably easy to trick into believing something happened when it didn't.
Should children (or women) be automatically disbelieved? Nope.
Should they be automatically believed? Nope.
Is there any real way to determine "evidence beyond a reasonable doubt" when the case is based entirely on one person's testimony versus that of another? Not really. Particularly when testimony impugning the "perpetrator's" character is allowed, and testimony casting doubt on the "victim's" veracity is often not allowed.
Note: The scare quotes in the preceding sentence are there simply to point out that the whole reason to hold a trial is to determine whether there is a "perpetrator" and a "victim." Using the terms as representing facts prejudges the accused as being guilty.
Please also note that I'd be fine with capital punishment in cases of genuine rape and particularly child rape. The problem is that individuals should not be assumed guilty and punished accordingly based primarily on past and present crimes committed by members of a group they happen to belong to, in this case males.
It is also very true that children who have not been sexually abused are sometimes cowed into making false accusations.!
REMEMBER THE LITTLE RASCALS DAY CARE CASE.
“How hysterical parents, incompetent therapists and malicious prosecutors
destroyed the lives of seven innocent North Carolinians – and
have yet to admit they were wrong”
http://littlerascalsdaycarecase.org
Excellent movie - Just ask my children.
Story of the Kiffen case out if California Kern county. One of the starting cases for the great child abuse witch hunts.
“A pedophilia witch-hunt is started in Bakersfield by two teenage girls’ foppish child abuse claims. Blindly ambitious justice officials, especially in the prosecutor’s office, conspire to arrest loving parents Scott and Brenda Kniffen, whose doted pre-teen sons Brian and Brandon are grilled endlessly until they repeat the vicious lies, the elder even ends up believing them while they pass from one foster home to the next, as even the grandparents are denied custody for not turning on their children. The defense’s rights are systematically denied, so the parents go to jail for 240 years. The boys are near adulthood when the political tide finally turns.”
- Written by KGF Vissers
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0280474/plotsummary?ref_=tt_ov_pl
The similarities to the Salem Witch Trials are quite astonishing.
With the exception that almost all those involved in the 17th century trials later had the decency and humanity to admit they had been deluded and wrong, and beg forgiveness of those they had injured.
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