Troy McClure
Suter will never be scratched
Are you over in the Galchenyk thread defending him? He just lost his job even before the court of public opinion could weigh in. He certainly hasn't had any criminal court declare him guilty.
Teams expecting suspensions as 2018 Hockey Canada investigation concludes (update 7/13) up to 8 players from Team Canada to be named
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Could the NHL suspend a player for no reason at all?
If a single player were suspended along with any others who were guilty of having done the things accused, would his life and career be salvageable in any way?
At what point would the NHL determine that they have standing and enough evidence to confidently terminate the future career of a player, if there were no conviction from a court?
In the event that an innocent player were associated with the crimes alleged, and had his career, family life, personal life, and future career obliterated; what would the satisfactory punishment be for the NHL in their defamation suit?
What laws actually changed from the pre-MeToo to the post-MeToo?
The law is quite clear on this:
A person who is in any way coerced, or inebriated enough, cannot consent.
It could easily be argued that the accuser was in no mental state to consent to anything, whether that be due to drinking, or simply by there being a condition present that she didn't feel comfortable to deny consent.
It's one of the main reasons that relationships between anyone and a subordinate, or between parties of a substantial difference in power (student and teacher; manager and employee; coach and pupil; etc) are outlawed through all forms of our society.
There is a perceived amount of coercion present even if the parties are completely consensual.
It didn't get to trial because the woman he raped was hounded into dropping the charges by Kobe fans, the media and his lawyers.
#KobeBryant's rape case is painful for what it says about us, not him
The Bryant case kicked off the decade that changed how we talk about sexual abuse, and that matterswww.salon.com
I don't think that sexual assault cases should be allowed to be dropped once they have been registered with any authority.
The cases should all be fully investigated, and the findings be made public like all other court documents are.
Either the accused is found guilty; or is found not guilty based on lack of evidence/a technicality; or the accuser is found to have made false statements in the accusation.
Punishment should be doled out accordingly.
I can say that anyone without an inkling of what burden of proof actually means, shouldn't make public pleas for the punishing of people they have pre-determined as guilty without having intimate knowledge of the facts.
Very poor evidence. Memory is very unreliable, and as time passes, becomes more and more questionable.
There isn't a single prosecutor who would rely entirely on witness testimony for any court case.
They would be chastised out of the courthouse and reprimanded by their bar.
Senility is setting in I see.
I'm getting up there a well and can't wait to meet everyone again for the first time.
Golden_Jet
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- Sep 21, 2005
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All court documents aren’t public, judge can seal them. Might be best sealed, for the victim, if there are trials.
You know what, I'd rather not spend my evening thinking about this thread. I wish you all health and happiness.
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- Oct 9, 2012
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As one of the senior staffer here, you should know better
Troy McClure
Suter will never be scratched
Suspended for nothing would end up before the league and PA arbitrators and maybe even in court. The NHLPA fights suspensions on behalf of players all the time, but we see every pro league successfully win lawsuits over their ability to suspend players. Tom Brady and the NFLPA embarked on a serious legal battle about this and lost.
But we see the league impose long suspensions on dudes who haven't been convicted (yet) of crimes all the time. Most suspensions for DUIs or domestic violence come before the player's action has been weighed in on by a jury.
I see a lot of folks in this thread creating hurdles under the guise of due process, but those hurdles simply don't actually exist and have never existed. It's strange to me that for all of the things players have done to get suspended, this situation is the one where a lot of dudes are speaking up mad about punishments.
There was enough proof for hockey Canada to pay out $3M dollars to the victim. I can make a claim tomorrow, how much do you think Hockey Canada will pay me to go away ? Zero.
Silky Johnson
I wish you all the bad things in life.
Don't know all the details but given his arrest and being charged seems like a reasonable outcome.
Is he even disputing it?
Had the police investigated and not arrested or charged him and then 5 years later there were accusations, I'd probably think they should wait for an arrest or charge before firing/suspending him.
I think there is a misconceptions here. I and the vast majority of posters who are sceptical of the accusations do not approve of rape or other criminal activity.
If arrested and charged, I think they should be suspended and possibly have their contracts voided. If convicted I think they should be banned from the league and spend time in jail.
I also believe in due process and other principals of justice that punishing people based on a simple accusations spits in the face of.
I happy to stand with minds like Maimonides, Cicero and Blackstone rather than HF posters like @Troy McClure, @Jeune Poulet or @Melrose Munch.
Is it really that difficult to take a charitable view of someone else's opinion?
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Chips
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- Aug 19, 2015
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Only if it’s not involving one of my favorite players.
Otherwise we seriously need to re evaluate our societal views on rape.
There are hurdles, though. That's probably one of the reasons it's taken so long. Lawyers upon lawyers would be involved, making sure every base is covered.
Even if you've made up your mind, or have a very strong hunch, this is an incredibly unique situation. I can't think of another similar case in any pro sports league. The primary differences:
1. No player has been directly accused by name. In all other situations, someone was. Ie. Trevor Bauer did terrible things. In this case, the alleged victim has not accused anyone directly, at least publicly. And if that doesn't happen, the NHL will be the ones making the names public. That's different. That's not reacting to what's already out there.
2. In most cases, while the accused hadn't been convicted, they had been charged. Again, that's not the case here. Historically, accusations without charges haven't led to suspensions (see: Kane, Doughty, etc).
It'll be fascinating to see what the league does, because if they hand out suspensions, it'll set a new standard (and you can definitely argue that that's a very good thing).
But like I said earlier, the NHL has been pretty conservative and both Bettman and Daly are not ones to push the envelope. So personally I'll believe it when I see it.
Obviously this will all be moot if the players are charged by police first. That'll make the next step very easy for the NHL.
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Silky Johnson
I wish you all the bad things in life.
Jesus. The suit was for 3 million dollars. The actual settlement is yet undisclosed.
It's also irrelevant as there was no admission of guilt and the accused were not involved in the decision.
If you found out that the settlement was only 3 dollars, would that change your mind on the incident?
MXD
Partying Hard
- Oct 27, 2005
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...You certainly don't have any issue having a very charitable view of yourself.
The lawsuit was 3.5M. Hockey Canada paid out $2.9M that year for all their settlements
I'm sure they decided to pay out millions of dollars because the guys were innocent.
Hockey Canada paying out the settlement would have had little to do with their belief in the guilt or innocence of the players. It's always a fairly basic cost calculation: is the settlement amount more or less than the cost of extended litigation and the negative PR that comes with it.
There's a reason why Hockey Canada was sued and not each player individually. Individual players would be much more likely to fight the accusation to clear their names. They'd be far less likely to settle, and even if they wanted to, would have had fewer resources to settle with.
Hockey Canada was fine with ambiguity so long as things stayed quiet and the dollar amount was right.
Obviously it's backfired spectacularly, but it took years until Rick Westhead decided to do some digging.
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Well that’s horrifying
You're forgetting the first part of most statutory laws' offense clauses:
That the burden of proof rests on the accuser to prove beyond a doubt (of variable degree depending on the statute and severity) that an offense has been committed.
All these people talking about rapists and whatnot, have already adjudged that the crime was committed, not merely allegedly.
In the case of Tom Brady: that the footballs were deflated and tampered with was determined by the investigation. The question was about Tom Brady's level of involvement and knowledge of the infraction.
That the offense was actually committed was proven beyond doubt during the investigation.
In the case of DUI suspensions, the charging information by the relevant police force will have the statement that a preliminary test was conducted and that the person was found to be reasonably expected to be under the influence.
Normally, subsequent tests are done, and the results of these are included in the charging information.
That something was done is, at this point, a forgone conclusion.
Whether the player can successfully fight off the charges afterwards, or not, the league has some legal standing to suspect wrongdoing.
In the event that the player is found not guilty, the league can defend its position by having relied on the charging information of the police.
In the cases of domestic violence, there is the charging information by the police based on the testimony of the victim.
The leagues can and do cite the charging information in order to defend their position in suspending a player.
Again, in the event that the player is found not guilty, the league has a reasonable basis for having suspended the player in the first place.
In this case, there is no information that the NHL can use in order to base the suspension on. If there isn't enough evidence that the league has been given access to (which is a major violation of due process until the police investigation is completed), then they go out on a long and fragile limb in suspending players and linking them to a heinous crime.
At the same time, the rights of the accused do not outweigh the rights of the victims to not be subject to this type of criminal activity.
It was not taken seriously enough by the alleged victim, and then worse than that by the police force.
That there was a civil suit and that it was settled out of court is despicable in my opinion.
These matters should be taken seriously, with significant resources for the investigatory bodies, and with extremely significant penalties for convictions, and also for proven false accusations. They should also be placed on absolute gag orders and have all parties' personal identifying information cloaked until a decision is made.
At that point, civil suits could be sought and in the event of guilt, the names of the convicted be released for all to know.
Not just horrifying, it's an absolute violation of what the civilized world believes is right and just.
No person has the right to assault another person, for any length of time.
Is any form of contact considered assault? No.
But the law is quite clear that contact that is unwanted, makes a person uncomfortable, and is generally accepted as unacceptable by society, is considered assault.
In some states, employers can terminate without any reason at all.
I’m coming into this late.. but if you’re asking if someone can be punished at work for stuff outside work.. yes.
I looked for the original post you made for context but gave up. I hate this thread
MilkofthePoppy
Registered User
- Oct 27, 2022
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After Amber Heard, Jian Ghomeshi, the Harvard Rape Hoax, and Jake Virtanen I will wait a bit before deciding to join the mob.
DaveMatthew
Bring in Peter
It'll be interesting if the NHL does indeed release names prior to the LPD investigation coming to a conclusion. If they do, it'll get ugly and fast.
Since no one has officially had the finger pointed directly at them yet (all there has been is amateur sleuthing), everyone seems content to have released their boilerplate statement and wait. But once someone is implicated by name, they'll go on the offensive with their "side". It'll get ugly.
I'm sure NHL teams want clarity, but that can't take precedence. You'd think the NHL has to let the police announce their findings first.
The Matt Araiza situation, for example, has gotten wild. Matt Araiza plans to sue alleged gang rape victim's lawyer for defamation
The Bills cut him as soon as the allegation surfaced, and he was later cleared by police.
The NHL will probably want to avoid 2 scenarios:
• They announce their investigation will not lead to suspension, and later, the police file charges. This will make them look completely incompetent.
• They issue stiff suspensions, and later, the police do not file charges. This will lead to a massive reaction from one specific side of the current "culture war".
Since no one has officially had the finger pointed directly at them yet (all there has been is amateur sleuthing), everyone seems content to have released their boilerplate statement and wait. But once someone is implicated by name, they'll go on the offensive with their "side". It'll get ugly.
I'm sure NHL teams want clarity, but that can't take precedence. You'd think the NHL has to let the police announce their findings first.
The Matt Araiza situation, for example, has gotten wild. Matt Araiza plans to sue alleged gang rape victim's lawyer for defamation
The Bills cut him as soon as the allegation surfaced, and he was later cleared by police.
The NHL will probably want to avoid 2 scenarios:
• They announce their investigation will not lead to suspension, and later, the police file charges. This will make them look completely incompetent.
• They issue stiff suspensions, and later, the police do not file charges. This will lead to a massive reaction from one specific side of the current "culture war".
The correct approach for all the wrong reasons.
Whether people are afforded the benefit of not being considered guilty a priori, should not depend on the results of previous and completely unrelated cases where some were initially considered guilty and subsequently found not gulty; but it should be a completely unalienable basic human right that we all are granted by virtue of being human.
It doesn't mean that people can't be guilty of crimes, but that everyone must be given the benefit of needing to be proven guilty instead of having to prove innocence.
The Amber Heard debacle and others like that should have no bearing at all in any criminal case going forward, on the basis of whether to hold the accused guilty until proven otherwise.
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