To think Cliff Richard and co should stop their awful campaign?

[PinkyOfPie]

news.sky.com/story/sir-cliff-urged-to-drop-campaign-for-anonymity-for-sex-offence-suspects-10620627

In a nutshell Cliff Richard and other well known men have launched a campaign to grant anonymity to accused sexual offenders.

AIBU to think they should FOTTFSOF? Aside from it being a well known fact the other victims come forward when they see their abuser/rapist has been charged, there is absolutely zero evidence to suggest a 'false' accusation of a sex crime impacts a person more than a false accusation of any other crime. Its a horrible rape myth that damages victims.

Also the official stats false accusations for rape and sexual assault (of which around 35 people are convicted a year in the U.K.) are no higher than false accusations any other crime.

So why in gods name would those accused of sexual crimes ever get special treatment?

So even though people are telling you the instances where that is indeed the case we must be lying. I'm just protecting my dh etc. What happened to you is true but what happened to me and my family is also true why is that so hard to believe????
I'm sick of feeling like I'm some sort of bad woman for sticking up for my husband.
I am sorry about what happened to you that was obviously wrong but can't you see that what happened to us is also wrong?

If she really had been found guilty then the media would have been all over it. It wouldn't have been ignored.

Of course innocent until proven guilty goes both ways.
If he is not proven guilty, he will be deemed innocent.
If she is not PROVEN to be lying, then she will be deemed innocent of that, which is the position in the vast majority of cases.

The difference is that she has lifelong anonymity, and his name will be smeared through the press, meaning he has a potential life time punishment, even though in the eyes of the law he is innocent.

Lets not forget, that in many cases, neither party is lying. Its entirely possible for a woman to feel like she was raped, and her 'attacker' to have felt that he didn't rape her. Sometimes reasonably, sometimes not. Its not necessarily a case of one person lying, but them having different perspectives on the same event.

btw i know the accusaction were false as he was not in the country at the time when the majorty of the "rapes" accored but the CPS took the case to trial even thought he was in the USA for the duration of when most of the rapes tooks place and was in hearthrow airpot when the first one accord (the only one of the allged rapes were he was even in the country).

While she might of been raped by someone she named HIM and only him as the rapist and for some stupid resaon the CPS took it to court the only good thing that came out of that horrid affair was that CPS reviewed their procedures when deciding to take cases to trial

So even though people are telling you the instances where that is indeed the case we must be lying.

No I'm saying that in a lot of cases of so called false accusations we don't actually know the accusations were false and we need to be careful about branding people liars.

Your evidence against this woman (and a lot of other cases here) is very flimsy and you need to think twice before accusing people of crimes without any proof.

A lot of the so called proof an accuser is a liar could easily be applied to genuine cases like mine. That's why I shared my stories.

My story changed, I talked about it, I've been sexually assaulted on two separate occasions...those things were used previously to "prove" someone was lying when they're not proof at all.

You can't turn around and say "this evidence proves this person is lying in this case but in this other case the same piece of evidence doesn't prove they're lying."

If you're going to say someone lied because they talked about it, they say it happened more than once, their story changed then according to you I'm a liar too and should be thrown in jail

I think Cliff Richard has a point... So do those who argue that publicity enables convictions that otherwise wouldn't have happened.

No media coverage until charged would be an appropriate balance. What happened to CR was indefensible... He wasn't even arrested

I'm also concerned by the 'no smoke without fire' tendency of some on here. The justice system (in England at least) is binary, and that's the way it should be. If someone is judged not guilty, society should presume innocence... Full stop...

I don't know the statistics but would guess, of all crimes, this may be the one which is the most under-reported, as it is. It's hard for victims to have any confidence in the system, or to come forward. So, on balance, I think it is a good thing to waive anonymity in such cases, if it helps other victims come forward.

Let's face it, men committing this kind of crime are highly likely to be recidivists. Where there is one victim, there may be others. With a lot of these Operation Yew Tree cases, you're looking at what are now elderly men - with potentially, decades of offending behind him. If this potential suspect got off from lack of evidence that does not categorically, clear him as 'innocent' (or mean he's guilty, either). If no-one else credible came forward, even after his name was out there then surely he should take that as a positive thing, right?

Dragging potential victims through more trauma would not reflect well on such people, either.

Your evidence against this woman (and a lot of other cases here) is very flimsy and you need to think twice before accusing people of crimes without any proof.

As it seems, it was against the man. Back to double standards again.

Yanbu in general sex crimes should not be treated any differently from other crimes. We have anonymity for accusers in sex crimes because otherwise people wouldn't come forward it's to assist justice and ensure that crimes are replete for the good of society and NOT to spare the individual who reports the crime. Giving defendants anonymity would not assist justice, so IMO there's no justification whatsoever from departing from the principle of open justice. Also open justice protects defendants as much as accusers. We don't want secret trials.

I never said her story changed. She lied pure and simple, it was proven that my dh was never there with her, she then admitted she lied to the police. By her talking about it and other people talking about it before all the facts had been gathered my life has dramatically altered. I don't know if she has since been raped. I struggle to believe her but obviously I have a skewed view of her and for that I will admit I was wrong. But the rest is true. My dh is in that 2% and it hurts believe me.

I have been trying to get my head around this.

I think when someone is charged/arrested they cannot be anonymous, in any type of crime. Noone should be publically accused prior to this.

They are still innocent until proven guilty.

I think the main problem is that if someone is not arrested - just publically accused, or if it goes to court but not proven guilty, there is still difficulty. They could be innocent or guilty.

They have to be treated as innocent. But at the same time the fact that there was evidence to bring charges/arrest needs to be known.

The same for someone who accuses. They should be treated as a victim/believed whether they bring charges or not. If the court case fails to convict that doesnt change my perception of them as a victim/believed. If they are accused of lying/maliciously bringing false charges, this should not be public.
Only if they are arrested/charged for doing so.
If they are not convicted then they should remain seen as a victim/believed and innocent.

The difficulty with above is that there are many more victims who do not have justice, than accused left with the record that charges were brought.

Anonymity is very important. The British system relies on 'innocent until proven guilty' and that's what is required.

The Christopher Jefferies case was so wrong on many counts.

As long as there is a single person who believes that someone is guilty when they haven't been charged because, hey, there just wasn't enough evidence, we need to protect the anonymity of those accused of certain types of crimes.

As long as there is a single person prepared to lie, to get money/publicity by accusing a well known person, we need to protect the anonymity of the accused.

To do otherwise, is to degrade the genuine victims.

I don't understand all this stuff about police swooping in to arrest men, take their children into care, interviewing the neighbours and telling them stuff... wtf? If it's true then the investigations into rapes are wildly inconsistent.

In my case the police apparently made an appointment (? not sure official term) for him to go and discuss it at his leisure. He works with children. It's basically my word against his and if it went to court I'd be absolutely torn to shreds, as a mentally ill woman. From the outside, I could easily be making it up. No-one will know about it from his pov unless he tells them.

I was also coerced into a position where a man then sexually assualted me, it feels like that is an ott thing to say as it was "just" repeated groping but actually the whole manipulation of the situation makes it much harder to deal with than the rape tbh. A few people know and some cognitive dissonance going on or simply don't beleve me I guess, because they happily socialise with the guy and dont even seem to understand why I hate being around him. If I knew he was facing charges of sexual offences I would report what happened. I daren't otherwise (and even in that situation it would be terrifying but I'd feel I had a duty to the victim) because people will characterisie me as a crazy bitch who's making it up, because this guy is very popular. Friend raved on about how he was such a special person and when she saw my expression, said, "oh yeh, well I know you don't like him".

So the idea that the accused is forever condemned strikes me as bullshit.

That said, the whole crashing into Cliffs house and so on isn't ok. But we're back to the wildly inconsistent thing again, aren't we? Is there a clear protocol that should be followed? Also, what is necessary for someone to be charged with rape/sexual assualt? - if there is no evidence other than the woman's word for it, why would someone actually be charged?

As long as there is a single person prepared to lie, to get money/publicity by accusing a well known person, we need to protect the anonymity of the accused.

What if more than a single man is prepared to get gratification by raping a woman? Unlikely I know. What if this single man has raped more than one woman? What if far far far more women have been raped than men accused - including the ones who go on to be convicted? Just what if that was where our priorities lay?

Lets not forget, that in many cases, neither party is lying. Its entirely possible for a woman to feel like she was raped, and her 'attacker' to have felt that he didn't rape her.

All well and good, BlueSky but you're missing out a vital step. It is the police who determine what charges to press and once the CPS get their hands on it the victim doesn't have a say anymore, except to refuse to be a witness in court (although their statements are still admissible).

I reported a 'sexual assault' to the police. Like you, I thought I knew what acts did and didn't constitute rape. I gave my statement and was told this wasn't assault, it was rape.

The CPS went after a conviction, but it was thrown out before it got to court. Not because it didn't happen, but purely because it amounted to 'he said, she said' and there wasn't a greater than 51% chance of conviction. The judge threw it out to be kinder to me, as the defense had been planning to rip me to shreds and I'd already had a breakdown over the whole thing.

So just because my rapist was free to resume his life it does not make me a liar. Even though he was charged and bailed, his name never came up anywhere in the media.

Whilst I agree that people should only be named in high profile cases once they have been charged, I disagree with CR's approach. By all means go after the BBC and the shits in the police who leaked the info in the first place. Don't try to change a law which, in most cases, is fit for purpose.

Its entirely possible for a woman to feel like she was raped, and her 'attacker' to have felt that he didn't rape her.

The law is pretty clear on rape.

It's a difficult balance to strike. I think there's an argument for this type of crime being treated differently, as if it helps the police's enquiries, to put out the name even at a time before charging - then the need to do so might out-weigh the need for the potential perpetrator's anonymity.

In this particular case, they seem to have felt there wasn't much evidence for the CPS, so the only way to garner a bit more might have been to float it out there, and see if anyone else came forward. This is presumably done with the potential plaintiff in mind.

Having been at the 'victim' end of an harassment case - twice - same perpetrator, mysteriously found innocent first time and finally banged to rights second - I can tell you from the inside of the system, EVERYTHING is weighted towards the defendant. Everything. The burden of proof is so high that even a palpably guilty person can walk free - as happened the first time in my harasser's case. Victims are made to feel like criminals - I was even followed into the toilet by court officials, in case I spoke with another witness. Yet the offender waltzed off to the loos, alone. I had to back up everything I said. The criminal - didn't. He told blatant lies under oath - and was instantly believed, even when a police officer tried to take the stand to point out he was lying...

Second time, even though he was found Guilty, everything was weighted in his favour. I wasn't even told I could make a victim impact statement - so I didn't submit one - so he got a suspended sentence. After years of trauma. I had to walk into court to take the stand right past all his friends and family, glaring at me. It was horrible. Even found guilty - he walked away scot free. I do feel for the victim in the case who has come forward and simply doesn't have enough for the CPS to go with.

I think the more sabre rattling goes on, the more risky it is that some other victim - with stronger evidence - could come forward so it is a dangerous game to play. In theory, I totally get innocent before proven guilty - but the reality is, even when they're found guilty, to get to that point, the system treats the victims very, very shabbily.

So it's time to weight it in their favour. Especially in cases like this, or things like harassment, where the fact is, it's rare even to get it to court, and the burden of proof is much higher than people who have only read about it in theory and not experienced it at the sharp end, would imagine.

By 'their' I mean the victims - weigh it in the victims' favour. (Or 'alleged victims' if you prefer).

The law is pretty clear on rape.

Lol, yes it is, and it entirely supports what I've written.

As just one example, the defence of reasonable belief in consent, means that quite easily both parties can believe they right. If she didn't consent, but he a reasonable belief that she did, it's possible for both to be telling the truth.

Bluesky Can you expand on that further? I see what you're getting at but it's just making me think of men who think consent is given forever by having sex with them once...

AVirginLitTheCandle - Sorry went to bed last night before replying when you asked if the girls told me themselves.

The girl who claimed she was tied to a tree, no she didn't tell me. Her mum was bad mouthing her about it though to everyone in the village (including me), she had of course admitted it to her mum (as she had done to the police). I don't know if she ever got charged with making false accusations but she certainly never got a prison sentence.

The other girl who claimed men had lraped her in a football changing rooms, she admitted it to me. She'll admit it to anyone, she thinks its extremely funny and that they deserve it. I'm pretty sure she never got charged over it but could be wrong. Again I know for certain she never went to prison over it.

However according to some people being both sexually assaulted and raped on two separate occasions is impossible and must mean I'm a liar - I haven't seen anyone suggest that, maybe I missed it. My mum was sexually assaulted as a child, raped in her teens and later raped on numerous occasions by her husband, so if anyone has suggested that I can promise them they are very much mistaken, it sadly can (and does) happen.

If she didn't consent, but he a reasonable belief that she did, it's possible for both to be telling the truth.

No really it's not that hard. If she doesn't want sex then she doesn't want sex.

Virgin nobody is suggesting you are a liar.But guilty until proven innocent is the cornerstone of our Judicial system.
Its very hard for raped women to be believed i realise that.But its as important for men accused of rape to have anonymity.

You cant take away their rights to a fair trial just because you believe teh woman.There are woman [and men] out there that accuse people of rape to be spiteful.

And if it does go to trial and they are found not guilty.It does not mean they didnt do it,but more importantly it does not mean they did.

do you know what I'm sure there are women that could post on here about my ex & say 'he was falsely accused, his ex was bitter and had MH problems, poor guy, his life's been ruined even though he was never charged'

but that doesn't change the fact that he has lied to everyone he knows about me and is, in fact, a rapist and a very good liar and a psychopath.

don't just assume someone was falsey accused. Most rapists don't admit it. Most rapists, if caught, don't feel guilty, they just feel unlucky.