wbtfg said:
Question for the legal minds....how would you rate the job of the prosecuters? Defense, obviously, did a fantastic job.
The prosecution could not win this case with the facts available to them. They knew it.
Was it a frivolous case? That's a close call. The Missoula County Attorney's office ordinarily does not prosecute borderline frivolous cases. But, using a sport analogy, if you're playing the game, and you know you are going to lose, you can still acquit yourself honorably, and play a "good" game.
The State, in this case, did not.
The witnesses appeared, to this observer, to have been the most poorly prepared witnesses, as a consistent pattern, I have ever seen. I'm not referring to "coaching witnesses," I am referring to the part of the process whereby witnesses are prepared for testifying by being prepped with "likely" questions, so that they are not surprised; "surprise" being the standard condition under which witnesses say stupid stuff. That's human nature, we would all do it under similar circumstances, and the job of attorneys is to inoculate against surprise and unpreparedness.
That didn't happen with the State's witnesses. Every single one of them.
In each key testimony, I would characterize the State's witnesses as "blowing up," on cross, leaving the Jury -- almost always at the end of the day when they would remember it most keenly -- with contradictory, even explosive testimony, given by witnesses who clearly did not know key facts about the case themselves, and even about their own testimony.
I got the impression of a group of attorneys, with highly inflated opinions of themselves, talking endlessly among themselves about their case and their strategy, their impressive motions in limine, their careful briefing of legal issues, and spending little time with the part of the trial that the Jurors would see and hear:
the actual witnesses and what they would say.
I cannot recall, on a prosecution case with
so many attorneys, offices, and staff, assigned to it, such horrible, blatantly negligent witness preparation.
The State's case was bound to be lost; but the attorneys handling it could have at least left the impression that they gave it a good shot, and an honorable try.
They didn't.
Instead, they left a perception of sloppy incompetence, pointless vindictiveness, and a gross waste of public funds, all of which appeared to simply be the result of using the high profile of this case to feed their "high profile" egos.
What does that mean for legitimate victims of rape? It means they are political tools, that sincere expressions of support are subordinate to political posturing and headline-grabbing. With the exception of Suzy Boylan, this "team" left the distinct impression that it was not motivated by a concern for "victims" or potential "victims," of rape, it was a primary motivation that "rape" is an ideological and political tool:, a chance to "make a name," an impression firmly left by the stunning lack of litigation quality on the State's presentation of the case, combined with the bias of the media coverage by the local paper.
The message they offered isn't about rape, or confused young people. Rather, for real victims, the message is that they are political and public relations leverage for the goals of others. They are not there for you, they are there for themselves. The faux concern for "victims" is merely a pretext.
For the falsely accused, the message is the same: guilt or innocence is not question for these people, rather, what's in it for them? Your life, if you are falsely accused, is an inconvenient fact, easily discarded if you are an attorney on the prowl for a "name," or a journalist on the prowl for an "award."
Both victims of rape and victims of false accusation have some common ground here: the cynical manipulation of their plights to serve the ideology and greed of others, irrespective of any objective truth. It hurts both the real victims of rape, and the real victims of false accusations. For both, their lives and their tragedies are at the mercy of predators.