'Clearly a drunk can consent,' Halifax judge says acquitting taxi driver charged with sexual assault - Polidicks

[QUOTE]A Halifax taxi driver found with an intoxicated, unconscious, mostly naked woman in his cab and her DNA on his mouth has been acquitted of sexual assault by a judge who said there wasn’t enough evidence to prove the woman’s “lack of consent.”Judge Gregory Lenehan ruled that Bassam Al-Rawi was not guilty of sexual assault in Halifax provincial court on Wednesday after he [URL="http://www.metronews.ca/news/halifax/2017/02/09/victim-trial-halifax-taxi-driver-accused-sexual-assault-.html"]st[U]ood[/U][/URL] [URL="http://www.metronews.ca/news/halifax/2017/02/10/logical-reasons-halifax-sexual-assault-victim-taxi-defence.html"]trial[/URL] last month for a May 23, 2015 incident. The complainant was found by police in Al-Rawi’s cab around 1:20 a.m., passed out after a night of drinking and being turned away from Boomers, a downtown bar. Her belongings were spread around the car as she lay in the backseat with her feet up on the two front seats, only a shirt partially covering her breasts. Her pants were also damp because she urinated on herself. Al-Rawi’s pants were partially undone and sitting lower on his body, the court heard. As police approached, they saw his seat was reclined and he attempted to hide the woman’s pants and underwear.[/QUOTE] wow

Can such a ruling be valid? I know from my time studying Criminal law in Canada that a person cannot be said to consent if they are intoxicated. It's in like a million instances of case law. Probably this verdict will be overturned shortly.

Ho lee shit

Pretty sure that this ruling won't stick. Case law dictates this is bullshit.

[QUOTE=archangel125;51897465]Can such a ruling be valid? I know from my time studying Criminal law in Canada that a person cannot be said to consent if they are intoxicated. It's in like a million instances of case law. Probably this verdict will be overturned shortly.[/QUOTE] I really can't imagine this not being overturned. This is against precedent and all case law on the subject. It seems like the judge went off his own thoughts entirely and didn't really care about the precedents.

[QUOTE=HumanAbyss;51897508]I really can't imagine this not being overturned. This is against precedent and all case law on the subject. It seems like the judge went off his own thoughts entirely and didn't really care about the precedents.[/QUOTE] Most likely a line of thought that began with victim shaming, with a small detour to the land of "well, boys will be boys!" This is fucking disgraceful and it has to be overturned. Drunk consent has never been considered actual consent.

In the Army, we got drilled over and over and over that having a fucking SIP of alcohol immediately invalidated consent (interestingly, if both parties were intoxicated, which ever one reports sexual assault first is considered the victim until the investigation is completed). I would imagine the same booze=nogo precedent applies to civilian law.

[QUOTE]"A Halifax taxi driver found with an[I][U][B] intoxicated, unconscious,[/B][/U][/I] mostly naked woman in his cab and her DNA on his mouth has been acquitted of sexual assault by a judge who said there [I][U][B]wasn’t enough evidence to prove the woman’s “lack of consent.”[/B][/U][/I] Judge Gregory Lenehan ruled that Bassam Al-Rawi was not guilty of sexual assault in Halifax provincial court on Wednesday after he stood trial last month for a May 23, 2015 incident."[/QUOTE] So does this mean it's okay to rob drunk people because there's not enough evidence to prove they [I]didn't[/I] want me to take their wallet? I sincerely believe this motherfucker has no business being a judge if this is his justification

Not just drunk, but unconscious... [I]wtf[/I]. There's no way of justifying that.

After having my own ordeal in court I can safely say some judges are retarded pricks and let people get away with whatever.

I think the "if you're drunk you can't consent!"-line of thought leads to some pretty dumb conclusions, and I kinda expected this to be a case of that... but what the fuck, how could you possibly say that everything in that situation was totally kosher? Also, I might be wrong, but here in Denmark if you get acquitted by a court, you can't be charged with the same crime again - would the same be the case here? This man shouldn't walk free.

so drunk she passed out and pissed herself yep, not enough evidence for lack of consent. How the fuck can he sleep at night

what the fuck? that is just completely against all legal statutes

-Snip, said in the heat of the moment-

Not to interrupt the circle jerk but a few things I'd like to point out. 1) There is no link to the article itself. There's literally just this quote box here, with two sub links to related articles. 2) The sub-links to sub-articles show there's more to this than an inflammatory quote taken out of context. [quote] The cab records show Al-Rawi picked up the victim on Grafton Street at 1:08 a.m. Saturday, which Craggs said leaves only a 10-minute window he could have decided to take advantage of the woman before police arrived, which he called “unlikely.” [/quote] 3) You're all being very silly and jumping to absurdly stereotypical conclusions.

[QUOTE=archangel125;51897465]Can such a ruling be valid? I know from my time studying Criminal law in Canada that a person cannot be said to consent if they are intoxicated. It's in like a million instances of case law. Probably this verdict will be overturned shortly.[/QUOTE] Doesn't it depend on the level of intoxication? There's no way a court would rule someone incapable of consenting after like 2 beers, but after a whole fifth of vodka yeah. Regardless it's semantics anyway, since she was drunk enough to piss herself and pass out she was clearly not in any state to consent. [editline]2nd March 2017[/editline] [QUOTE=GoDong-DK;51898500]I think the "if you're drunk you can't consent!"-line of thought leads to some pretty dumb conclusions, and I kinda expected this to be a case of that... but what the fuck, how could you possibly say that everything in that situation was totally kosher? Also, I might be wrong, but here in Denmark if you get acquitted by a court, you can't be charged with the same crime again - would the same be the case here? This man shouldn't walk free.[/QUOTE] Yes, it's the same here, but this can (and probably will) be appealed to the Supreme Court of Canada, which has a higher authority than the Provincial Court of Nova Scotia, basically on the grounds that this judgment is shit. IIRC a defendant or plaintiff has either 30 or 90 days (can't remember which) to formulate and apply for an appeal, but there must be grounds for the appeal (which there almost always are, it's stupid easy to find grounds for an appeal, but the Supreme Court can still reject to hear the case if they so choose). In this case, the grounds will be that it flies in the face of the conclusions of numerous previous cases.

[QUOTE=Crazy Ivan;51901020]Not to interrupt the circle jerk but a few things I'd like to point out. 1) There is no link to the article itself. There's literally just this quote box here, with two sub links to related articles. 2) The sub-links to sub-articles show there's more to this than an inflammatory quote taken out of context. 3) You're all being very silly and jumping to absurdly stereotypical conclusions.[/QUOTE] Sorry I forgot the source [url]http://www.cbc.ca/beta/news/canada/nova-scotia/bassam-al-rawi-taxi-cab-sexual-assault-halifax-1.2875142[/url]

Can a drunk woman still consent if she's unconscious? Goddamn

[QUOTE=GoDong-DK;51898500]I think the "if you're drunk you can't consent!"-line of thought leads to some pretty dumb conclusions, and I kinda expected this to be a case of that... but what the fuck, how could you possibly say that everything in that situation was totally kosher? Also, I might be wrong, but here in Denmark if you get acquitted by a court, you can't be charged with the same crime again - would the same be the case here? This man shouldn't walk free.[/QUOTE] It's the same under US law (Double Jeopardy clause) but it could go to case law and the ruling struck down due to the precedents set. Not sure about Canada, though I think our legal systems are fairly similar.