Accused says he is innocent of rape because he can't remember it. [title edited by MNHQ at OP's request]

[anotherhumanfemale]

metro.co.uk/2020/08/11/army-major-trial-raping-female-captain-claims-victim-13116280/

His DNA was in her.

He said he can't remember (but seems to remember quite a lot else..).

Therefore it didn't happen.

In fact, she forced him according to him, because according to him he definitely didn't.

He also has a child, so he didn't have sex with her when he was so drunk that he can't remember how his DNA got inside her.

To be fair it sounds like they were both absolutely hammered and neither remembers anything.

Yes.

Both hammered. But he remembers her coming to his room, flirting, bringing her back to her room, falling asleep on her chair etc. But has no memory of how his sperm ended up in her vagina.

I'm very suspicious.

And see this as a very worrying precedent for those who are accused, when of course, the "rough sex" defence isn't applicable...

Or maybe he's the 1 in a million who truly doesn't remember in those circumstances, but the idea has been put out there and shown that it works.

It's a far more worrying precedent that you have convicted someone whose trial is not over without ever having actually heard the evidence, just a sensationalized partial version in a newspaper. I don't know whether he raped her, or whether they were both so hammered that neither knew what they were doing. Perhaps the decision should be left to those who've actually heard the evidence?

Well, we’ve had the millionaire who tripped and fell dick first into a sleeping female house guest acquitted of rape. I can’t say this is any less bullshitty as a defence.

He's not been cleared.

It doesn’t say he has been cleared.

It's a far more worrying precedent that you have convicted someone

Um, making a comment is not "convicting" someone. And it definitely carries no legal precedent.

Courts aren't about truth anyway, they're about determining whether there is legal cause for the state to deprive someone of their liberty or impose another punishment. Truth has little to do with it, people don't have to pretend otherwise.

@Smallsteps88

It doesn’t say he has been cleared.

You're right. I actually came across this elsewhere and linked this write up of it instead. I see it here at the end but didn't see it in the other (may have been there and I missed it!)

At least it made it to court my ex has been arrested three times for three separate offences and it has been dropped three times the victims all report coercion by the police to withdraw the charges the last two victims stories are scarily similar and they have never had any contact with each other (I know for a fact and it's far to outing to say how)

Our country is shite on prosecution

I'm going to ask MN if they'll edit the title as it's not correct.

@slipperywhensparticus

At least it made it to court my ex has been arrested three times for three separate offences and it has been dropped three times the victims all report coercion by the police to withdraw the charges the last two victims stories are scarily similar and they have never had any contact with each other (I know for a fact and it's far to outing to say how)

Our country is shite on prosecution

I'm really sorry to hear that.

Maybe this progressed differently because it's a military court?

Is there a factual link?

Unfortunately the military culture around drinking isn't the healthiest, and people drinking themselves into oblivion at mess events is run of the mill. Things like putting drunk people to bed happens frequently. So the 'too drunk to remember' thing will sound very plausible to any senior officer.