Just how much the Long March left have debased our institutions is obvious in too many ways. Not least the fact that a former chief prosecutor apparently has to remind judges and politicians of a bedrock principle of Common Law – the presumption of innocence.
Former ACT chief prosecutor Anthony Williamson says a proposition by the territory’s former attorney-general that victims of sexual assault should be believed was a “dangerous one”, amid a growing civil war in Canberra’s tight-knit legal profession over the handling of rape cases.
That this has happened in the Australian Capital Territory is both unsurprising and deeply worrying. Unsurprising, because the ACT is one of the most out-of-touch elitist jurisdictions in Australia. But deeply worrying, because it is the seat of the federal government.
Also unsurprising is that the latest attack on procedural fairness should come from the Greens. Also disturbing, though, is that this Greens zealot is Attorney-General.
[Shane Rattenbury] told the Legislative Assembly the community had a responsibility to listen to victims of sexual assaults and believe them, according to The Canberra Times, which reported the comments last week.
Last month, chief justice of the ACT Supreme Court Lucy McCallum declared that she does not understand why jurors “find it so hard to believe” allegations of sexual assault and that she has a “feeling of unease” when it comes to how juries approach cases.
In other words, both of these supposed law experts want jurors to disregard the fundamental principle of presumption of innocence and immediately presume guilt instead. It’s not just a failure of basic legal principle, but a failure of basic logic as well. Reversing the burden of proof – demanding that someone prove an accuser wrong, rather than the accuser prove themselves right – is a too-common logical fallacy.
Who’d stake their chances on a fair trial from either of those two?
Former acting Director of Public Prosecutions Mr Williamson, responding to comments made by Shane Rattenbury in the ACT Legislative Assembly last week, said while any allegation of sexual offending should be “listened to and taken seriously by police”, and always carefully and thoroughly investigated, the starting point “cannot be that the victim is automatically believed”.
“Rather, the starting point should be to carefully and objectively weigh and assess all the available evidence to see what conclusion it leads to,” he said.
In fact, the starting point should and must be the null hypothesis: that the accused is innocent. This is, as stated above, a fundamental principle of law and logic.
Rattenbury responded by doubling down on his fallacious logic.
Mr Rattenbury in the Legislative Assembly on Wednesday said Mr Buckland’s statement was “utter nonsense” and the ACT Bar Association “have an interest in the system believing rape myths because it means that their clients, charged with sexual assaults, are more likely to be found not guilty”.
He added that we needed to “raise awareness that false sexual assault allegations are rare”.
In fact, they very much are not.
Logically, every failed rape case is, ipso facto, a false accusation. Aside from that, the limited data available suggests that false allegations of sexual assault and rape are by far the commonest category of false allegation: anywhere from 10 to 25 per cent. This is far higher than any other category of alleged crime, where demonstrably false allegations run at around two to five per cent.
Indeed, in a particularly notorious recent case in Canberra, a policeman’s ex went to great and malicious lengths to fabricate allegations against him. The innocent man ended up in prison for months, where a policeman’s lot is very much not an ’appy one, before the truth came out.
It was also in the ACT that former chief prosecutor Shane Drumgold ended his career in spectacular fashion, over his zealous pre-determination to prosecute the Brittany Higgins-Bruce Lehrmann case. His egregious actions included knowingly lying to a chief magistrate – none other than Lucy McCallum.
Now, the disgraced Drumgold is lecturing to future lawyers at the University of Canberra.
It’s a very small and very weird world, the ACT.
