In message , Mike_B
writes
>In message , Richard Miller
> writes
>>In message <38cju3dtm4gcd8t5br457afvv83n8je35d@4ax.com>, Mike Ross
>> writes
>>
>>>From: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/merseyside/7313130.stm
>>>
>>>"A woman who told a gang of swearing teenage girls to be quiet spent
>>>16 hours in
>>>a police cell after being falsely accused of assault.
>>
>>Says who? Oh yes, says the defendant.
>>
>>[Snip]
>>>
>>>Despite protesting her innocence, the mother-of-seven was held in a
>>>police cell
>>>for 16 hours before being charged with common assault."
>>>
>>>"On the first day, magistrates agreed to a defence submission that
>>>there was no
>>>case to answer after it emerged the scratches were accidental."
>>
>>The way this is phrased appears to be a tacit admission that the
>>defendant caused the scratches.
>>
>>This looks like a classic example of the news report taking only the
>>defendant's version of events, and presenting it as if it were gospel.
>>There were scratches. They appear to have been caused by the
>>defendant. There appears to have been no proof of intent. This does
>>not look like a miscarriage of justice to me, but a case where the
>>police and Courts followed the proper course to a natural conclusion.
>
>Well, apart from the possibility that as there was no case to answer,
>that should have been recognised earlier and the case perhaps not
>brought.
>
Of course, there being no case to answer could be down to a key witness
not attending trial when they were expected to do so. That is as common
a cause of such submissions as the prosecution not actually having a
valid case to start with. It *may* be that the prosecution simply got it
wrong and the case should have been dropped weeks ago. That certainly
happens. But there most certainly is not sufficient evidence here to
conclude that this *is* the case.
--
Richard Miller |