Remove complainant anonymity;
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introduce a strict statute of limitations for criminal prosecutions and civil actions;
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reduce the age of consent to 13.
Barbara Hewson has the courage to make such suggestions in today’s sex hysterical climate. Unfortunately, she is alone, against the hysterical masses, the mainstream press and loud feminists and so called child protection agencies.
the most remarkable facet of the Savile scandal is how adult complainants are invited to act like children. Hence we have witnessed the strange spectacle of mature adults calling a children’s charity to complain about the distant past.
The acute problems of proof which stale allegations entail also generates a demand that criminal courts should afford accusers therapy, by giving them ‘a voice’. This function is far removed from the courts’ traditional role, in which the state must prove defendants guilty beyond reasonable doubt.
Constitutional rights to due process have been abolished for men.
What this infantilising of adult complainants ultimately requires is that we re-model our criminal-justice system on child-welfare courts. These courts (as I have written in spiked previously) have for some decades now applied a model of therapeutic jurisprudence, in which ‘the best interests of the child’ are paramount.
It is depressing, but true, that many reforms introduced in the name of child protection involve sweeping attacks on fundamental Anglo-American legal rights and safeguards, such as the presumption of innocence. This has ominous consequences for the rule of law, as US judge Arthur Christean pointed out: ‘Therapeutic jurisprudence marks a major and in many ways a truly radical shift in the historic function of courts of law and the basic purpose for which they have been established under our form of government. It also marks a fundamental shift in judges’ loyalty away from principles of due process and toward particular social policies. These policies are less concerned with judicial impartiality and fair hearings and more concerned with achieving particular results…’
The therapeutic model has certain analogies with a Soviet-style conception of justice, which emphasizes outcomes over processes. Yewtree is destroying the rule of law
Courageous words for a famous lawyer
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