"Victim-Centered Justice" Makes Victims Out Of The Falsely Accused
I'm reminded of "feminist" science groups -- which I vehemently refuse to join and want nothing to do with, and not just because I am not a feminist but a humanist (someone who cares about the rights of all people, regardless of what sex they are).
For me, there is only science, not feminist science or masculinist science or any other flavor.
Likewise for justice.
Seeing that justice is done involves impartially investigating any charge that is made -- not doing the disgusting thing that "victim-centered justice" demands: "A thorough investigation must therefore begin from a position of Start by Believing" -- as in believing the person who is accused.
At The Daily Caller, Victor Zheng describes the hell he went through after he was accused of sexually assaulting his ex-girlfriend:
I was in the middle of my summer class when my phone went off around 11:40 am on Thursday, July 18th, 2013. It was my ex-girlfriend. As I answered, I heard her voice insisting that I admit to perpetrating an incident of sexual misconduct against her. I was puzzled by her request and did not know how to respond.A few minutes later I received a call from Darrin DeCoster, a Fairfax County, Virginia detective, who revealed the phone call was being recorded. Ordering me to not hang up, he threatened to arrest me on a "slew" of charges if I did not cooperate. As a 20-year-old in college, I was scared beyond imagination.
I was instructed to appear for an interview the next day at the Fairfax County Police Station. Since I was completely innocent, what did I have to fear? I assumed the police would conduct an unbiased investigation of the matter. That was before I heard about "victim-centered" investigations.
The interrogation consisted of repeated attempts to get me to confess to something that I had supposedly done. The detective hinted that the charge had something to do with sexual assault, but he refused to tell me any details. He said that he could work out a deal with me and convince the district attorney to reduce the punishment.
...My ex-girlfriend said the alleged assault happened in the spring of 2012 while we were both in high school without specifying a date or month. I was stunned to later learn that she claimed that we had never had a romantic relationship.
The detective also interviewed several of her friends. One claimed that he had picked up my ex-girlfriend after the assault during the spring of 2013 - not 2012 -- while I was a student at Virginia Tech. The detective was not deterred by the fact that I have never attended Virginia Tech, nor have I ever been to the town of Blacksburg.
On October 3rd, right before one of my history classes at the University of Virginia, I was arrested in front of my peers. I would go on to endure five nights and six days in jail.
An interesting note to add is that the detective was not present at the initial bail hearing despite efforts from the prosecutor to try to reach him. Without the detective present and any information, the judge allowed me to leave jail while I awaited my trial. During the time between my bail hearing and the preliminary hearing, I took and passed a polygraph test, at my own expense, to supplement my growing cache of exculpatory evidence. At my preliminary hearing, I brought over 40,000 documents in the form of emails, text messages, and other social media interactions that proved my ex-girlfriend and I indeed did have a romantic relationship.
The rape and abduction charges were soon dropped and the prosecutor agreed to have all charges expunged. Despite this favorable outcome, I now had to face $60,000 in attorney's fees, on top of the fact that I lost a semester's worth of school as I was unable to salvage any credits. And nothing could compensate for my suffering during six days in jail.
Hideous wrong done here. Anyone truly interested in justice -- rather than promoting a victimist ideology and going after men -- would see that.
via @CHSommers
"The interrogation consisted of repeated attempts to get me to confess to something that I had supposedly done."
So it was like every police interrogation in history?
dee nile at April 22, 2016 4:05 AM
While not minimizing what happened to him, his first mistake was to engage in any way with the officer who called him. He should have simply hung up the phone, refused any demand that he 'come down to the station', especially refused to have anything whatever to do with the witch-doctory of yhe polygraph, and immediately found a criminal lawyer.
An officer who questions you about crimes without telling you what they are is fishing. Even if you are totally innocent of any crime whatever, you do yourself no service by engaging in any way with his fishing expedition. Don't participate. It's easy to do.
Don't abswer any questions. Don't do anything or go anywhere voluntarily. Especially don't submit to a polygraph. Get a good lawyer - Not a public defender! - and do only what he tells you.
The idea that 'if I've done nothing wrong, then I have nothing to fear' is hopekeasly naive. It is precisely the truly-innocent who need the most vigorous protections.
llater,
llamas
llamas at April 22, 2016 4:36 AM
I think one of the hardest "lessons" to be learned is that our "bureaucracies" can not be totally trusted to do what's in OUR OWN best interests.
Hospitals, LEOs, and definitely schools/churches are basically living breathing organisms that have ritual-like procedures and whose primary functions are to survive disruptions in their processes and from misbehaviour by their members.
Learn the system and use it.
Bob in Texas at April 22, 2016 6:31 AM
He'll probably be a mite skittish about any more romantic involvements.
"Hell hath no fury" indeed. What a c***.
Canvasback at April 22, 2016 6:48 AM
Ordering me to not hang up
When in doubt, always invoke your right to legal counsel. Always. Tell me your name and badge # and I'll have my lawyer call you back.
Learn the system and use it.
Ding! The Soviet refusniks in the 1970s discovered that the gulags had their bureaucratic rituals, and so filed massive numbers of complaints. Not that they complaint would lead to a correction, but because they knew the bureaucrats would have to take the complaint, investigate the complaint, and then close the complaint and then file away the case files.
Because those were the rules, and they had to be followed, even if the complainer was just being a royal pain.
I R A Darth Aggie at April 22, 2016 7:53 AM
When asked questions by cops I always say
"Due to several court rulings I am invoking my right to remain silent and must insist any and all questions be submitted in writing and any questioning I am forced to attended be video taped by both myself and your force"
Cops can lie about investigating you and claim to be investigating someone else
Cops can lie about what you said to them when there is no video evidence
DAs while not able to use your right to remain silent against you due to a court ruling (under appeal last time I checked) can use the fact that were cooperating with an interview up until (this question) was asked of you
lujlp at April 22, 2016 8:03 AM
"Get a good lawyer - Not a public defender!"
Bad advice. A lot of families think that anything given to them at no cost must be crap and anything that costs a lot must be good. They're wrong on both counts.
The quality of PDs may depend on where you are, but in my experience (CA only), experienced PDs know all the local players and spend most of their time making deals. A good PD would have gotten rid of this case fast. And while there are rookie PDs who don't know everything, they usually know what they don't know and they have the resources of an entire office to draw on to fill in the gaps. A solo private attorney may not be that good but will talk a good game because no one wants to see that fee walk out the door.
As to finding a good criminal lawyer, people with no prior contact with the system often have no idea how to find one. Middle-class folks with a son in college don't even know who to ask, because their friends are also middle-class folks with kids in college. Something like a little mj bust when the kid was still a minor doesn't prepare most parents for dealing with something like this.
This young man made a huge mistake in not lawyering up immediately, but he may also have made a mistake in not going with the PD first. If he didn't like the PD, he could have begged Mom and Dad to hire a private attorney to substitute in. But given the quality of this case, it's likely that a private attorney wouldn't do as well as or any better than a PD, and the family wouldn't be paying off $60K in fees for the next who-knows-how-many years.
Szoszolo at April 22, 2016 11:12 AM
"Anyone truly interested in justice -- rather than promoting a victimist ideology and going after men -- would see that."
Well, that rules out the Obama Administration, the California Attorney General, the L.A. District Attorney's office, and frankly, all feminist women and their white-knight, do-anything-to-please orbiters.
Jay R at April 22, 2016 12:24 PM
civil suit against the ex girlfriend, no?
MarkD at April 22, 2016 12:38 PM
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