It matters who you are...


Jamie123
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The big news in the UK right now (apart from the small matter of the Prime Minister resigning) is that the man long referred to as "Nick" - real name Carl Beech - who brought allegations of child rape and torture against a whole raft of senior politicians and military commanders, which were described as "credible and true" by police even before they had investigated the matter, and received £22,000 "compo" has finally been convicted of making the whole thing up. The papers are full of stories of "raided homes" and "ruined lives" etc.

Now don't get me wrong: I'm glad the little toerag has been brought to justice, and I hope those who took his stories at face value will be a lot more careful in future about what they choose to believe "credible and true". But I wonder if any of this would have happened if his victims had been ordinary people - not top generals, ex cabinet ministers - none of whom (I believe) were even charged, let alone convicted or imprisoned. Ex fire-chief David Bryant spent three years in prison on uncorroborated child rape accusations by a certain Danny Day, who was later shown to be a compulsive liar. (He even tried to boost his "compo" claims by saying he was forced to quit the Olympic boxing team due to PTSD - a lie which was quickly exposed by private investigators. And yes it is OK to name him: he waived his right to anonymity back when people were calling him a "very brave man", but has most likely changed his name now the truth is out.)

Is Day going to be prosecuted? Well - no. Why not? Well you won't get an answer out of the police, but I think it has something to do with Bryant never having been Prime Minister, or Head of the Army, or a member of the cabinet. If you're any of those things you can expect to see your persecutor punished even if you were never even arrested, let alone charged, tried or imprisoned for three years.

Edited by Jamie123
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  • 9 months later...

Looks like I was wrong: it's been a long time coming, but Danny Day has now finally been charged with perverting the course of justice: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/13/rape-accuser-trial-allegations-put-innocent-fire-chief-prison/.

It makes me wonder: its been four years since Bryant's conviction was declared "unsafe", and two years since the High Court ruled that Day did make up the allegation. And only now is something being done about it.

Compare that with the original case: Day brought the complaint in 2012, and by January 2014 they already had Bryant "strung up like a kipper", convicted, behind bars, and placed for life on the "sex offenders register".

It's speedy justice for former top politicians and retired senior army officers. Slow as cold molasses flowing uphill for anyone else.

Edited by Jamie123
Too nasty - just 'coz Day lied and got rich off it it doesn't mean its the same for all complainants.
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Fist of all there are two different levels of court and this type of case will be dealt with at the magistrates court level which deals with less serious cases and as there are significantly more of these (and many crown court cases have to pass through the magistrates court to be assigned as a crown court case) has a much longer wait time.

Also perverting the course of justice is a less serious offense of the types dealt with in the magistrates court so will be placed further down the list of court dates. 

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1 hour ago, KScience said:

Fist of all there are two different levels of court and this type of case will be dealt with at the magistrates court level which deals with less serious cases and as there are significantly more of these (and many crown court cases have to pass through the magistrates court to be assigned as a crown court case) has a much longer wait time.

Also perverting the course of justice is a less serious offense of the types dealt with in the magistrates court so will be placed further down the list of court dates. 

I'm not 100% certain you're right. Carl Beech was tried by a crown court before a jury, for essentially the same thing David Day is now accused of. The difference (maybe) is that he was also charged with fraud, which may have upped the status of the case. (Day certainly should be charged with fraud too - he bogusly applied for and given criminal compensation, and attempted to get more money by suing the local council on the grounds that he was a thwarted Olympic boxer - something we now know was untrue. This is one more reason I think Beech's accusees are getting preferential treatment - its a much more serious crime to wrongly accuse a former prime minister than it is to stitch up a retired firefighter, and sell him down the river for a bit of dirty cash!)

P.S. I don't think court delays have anything to do with it anyway. The case has only just reached the course system, and any "wait for a court date" begins now. The delay so far has been down to the police and the cps dragging their heels over whether or not to switch sides.

P.P.S. Do "less serious cases" really have to wait longer for trial? If so, then if Bill kills his mother and Ben steals a packet of Polos, Ben has to wait longer than Bill to be tried? 

Edited by Jamie123
A few other thoughts.
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The article is behind a paywall, so I can only see the first part. Things like this really fry my bacon. I do not understand the legal theory that disallows punishing those who make a patently false accusation with the same outcome that their victims would have suffered.

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1 hour ago, Vort said:

The article is behind a paywall, so I can only see the first part. Things like this really fry my bacon. I do not understand the legal theory that disallows punishing those who make a patently false accusation with the same outcome that their victims would have suffered.

Yep it is a pay site - and unfortunately The Telegraph seems to be the only mainstream media outlet covering this story at the moment.

I found the same story here: https://www.thejusticegap.com/chronic-liar-charged-with-perverting-the-course-of-justice-over-false-allegations/ except of course this is not a "mainstream" site, and we know how biased they can be compared to respectable broadsheets like The Telegraph, eh Anatess? 😉

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14 hours ago, Vort said:

I'm disgusted beyond words by this. I would like to believe that such a thing would be highly unlikely to happen in the US. I am not convinced that is true.

It's important to remember what was going on in the UK at the time of the original case. In October 2011 Jimmy Savile died, and some people began to allege that he had abused them as children. At first they were brushed off, but there were eventually so many such reports that the authorities had to sit up and take notice. It transpired that there had been many complaints about Savile during his lifetime which had been hushed up. BIG EMBARRASSMENT!! There was soon a nationwide inquiry into the matter ("Operation Yewtree"), and senior police were appealing for victims of Savile (or anyone else) to come forward. They said they were sorry that victims had not been taken seriously, but NOW they WOULD BE BELIEVED!

What more fertile ground for the likes of Carl Beech and Danny Day to plant their poisonous seeds? The nation was so disgusted with the Savile affair that anyone accused of anything similar wouldn't stand a chance. Police and prosecutors were too terrified not to bring charges. And it was the same with people in general: you should have seen the comments on the Bournmouth Echo website (mostly now deleted) reporting Bryant's conviction: a few brave posts daring to suggest that there was "no real proof" were heavily down-voted, shouted down with "If you think that, you must be a pedophile yourself!" (all heavily up-voted). I can only imagine the abuse the one dissenting juror in the Bryant/Day case must have received from the other eleven.

In short, this all started with a genuine concern which needed to be addressed, but was not addressed in a sensible or proportionate manner. But if you think this is a peculiarly British problem which would "never happen in the "good ol' US of A", think back to the Red Scare of the 1950s. The threat of communism was real, for sure, but did it really warrant all the excesses of McCarthyism? 

Edited by Jamie123
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7 hours ago, Jamie123 said:

The nation was so disgusted with the Savile affair that anyone accused of anything similar wouldn't stand a chance.

This is a serious indictment of the character of Brits. Again, I would like to believe that Americans would never succumb to such Groupthink, but sadly, Americans are just as ignorant and small-minded as anyone else.

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13 minutes ago, Vort said:

This is a serious indictment of the character of Brits.

It's an overstatement, but there's an element of truth to it. And it applies to societies in general, not just the Brits. Everyone wants to belong to the battalion of white knights, fighting the dragons and ogres on the other side. And when deciding who's the white knight and who's the dragon, its much less trouble to go with the crowd - otherwise they might decide YOU'RE one of the dragons! I've made that mistake myself many a time.

Edited by Jamie123
Wrong sort of knights
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On the matter of UK vs. US justice, it's worth noting the case of William McCaffrey: he was convicted of the rape and torture of Biurney Gonzales in New York in 2006 and sentenced to 20 years. The jury chose to put 100% trust in the word of an innocent-looking girl from the Dominican Republic, despite there being no other evidence, and the fact that the rape kit administered by the police had returned negative!

Just like in the Day/Bryant case there was a grassroots campaign to prove McCaffrey's innocence. They turned up evidence that the bite marks on Gonzales were not only not those of McCaffrey, but they had not even come from a man (the DNA was female). The authorities were going through the usual bluster of denial when in 2009 - quite out of the blue - Gonzales (now married with kids) admitted that she had made the whole thing up. She confessed it first to her priest, but he (quite properly) refused her absolution until she had told the authorities. Even then the police tried to hold things together, claiming Gonzales' confession had been somehow "coerced", but the conviction really was beyond saving. McCaffrey was freed, and Gonzales got 3 years. (Only her marriage saved her from being deported from the US on release.)

McCaffrey of course shouldn't have been convicted at all, any more than Bryant should, but there's no denying the US were a lot quicker than the UK to punish the real villain once she was identified.

I must say though, I can't help admiring Biurney Gonzales. However belatedly she did do the right thing, despite enormous cost to herself and her family. 

Edited by Jamie123
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For the record, I've been mourning the severely indicted character of Americans for decades now. I'm one of those people who think that America is something important and stands for something in the world, or at least should. So whenever I'm pointing the finger at other nations, I'm usually pointing three back at my own country.

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23 hours ago, Jamie123 said:

It's an overstatement, but there's an element of truth to it. And it applies to societies in general, not just the Brits. Everyone wants to belong to the battalion of white knights, fighting the dragons and ogres on the other side. And when deciding who's the white knight and who's the dragon, its much less trouble to go with the crowd - otherwise they might decide YOU'RE one of the dragons! I've made that mistake myself many a time.

This is just sad.  It doesn't matter who you are - COURAGE and Strength of Character is not something only required for comicbook heroes.  To call Courage a "mistake" is a terrible defeat to your own humanity.  I don't know how Americans and Europeans - the descendants of warriors - lost their spine but y'all better find it quick.

 

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36 minutes ago, anatess2 said:

This is just sad.  It doesn't matter who you are - COURAGE and Strength of Character is not something only required for comicbook heroes.  To call Courage a "mistake" is a terrible defeat to your own humanity.  I don't know how Americans and Europeans - the descendants of warriors - lost their spine but y'all better find it quick.

You misunderstand me. It's lack of courage that's the mistake. The mistake is to take the easy way out - to convince yourself that black is white, and then kid yourself that you're showing courage by joining the braying mob. As (I'm ashamed to admit) I have often done.

I know you LDS are rather fond of a hymn by a certain Scotsman...

Quote

In pris’n I saw him next, condemned

To meet a traitor’s doom at morn.

The tide of lying tongues I stemmed,

And honored him ’mid shame and scorn.

If only it were easier to "stem" a "tide of lying tongues". But if more of us tried instead of adding our own tongues to the lying ones (for fear of meeting a "traitor's doom" of our own), the world would be a better place.

Edited by Jamie123
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On 5/17/2020 at 3:28 AM, Jamie123 said:

The nation was so disgusted with the Savile affair that anyone accused of anything similar wouldn't stand a chance.

 

On 5/17/2020 at 10:38 AM, Vort said:

This is a serious indictment of the character of Brits. Again, I would like to believe that Americans would never succumb to such Groupthink, but sadly, Americans are just as ignorant and small-minded as anyone else.

Back when the first movies (silent) came out there was a movie about a corrupt sheriff (of course taking advantage of a young good looking lady).  When the movie showed in one little town - it so reminded the town folk of their own sheriff that at the end of the movie, they went and lenched their sheriff.   The media is not always the innocent bystander - often it is the catalysts. 

 

The Traveler

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19 hours ago, Traveler said:

Back when the first movies (silent) came out there was a movie about a corrupt sheriff (of course taking advantage of a young good looking lady).  When the movie showed in one little town - it so reminded the town folk of their own sheriff that at the end of the movie, they went and lenched their sheriff.   The media is not always the innocent bystander - often it is the catalysts. 

 

The Traveler

Narratives can easily become more real to you than what you actually know...

 

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