British Expatriate Network

http//news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/church_abuse_shanley.


Found guilty today how many more of these animals lurk in the shadows waiting to abuse our children .???

That link didn't work
Try this

http//story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&e=4&u=/ap/20050207/ap_on_re_us/church_abuse_shanley

Sorry thanks for the help -)

I wouldn't be at all surprised if this eventually gets overturned on appeal. The verdict depended entirely on whether the jury accepted the dubious premise or 'recovered memories' (allegedly it did).

In reality this is a classic example of the jury convicting based on media reports and information they obtained prior to the trial. The very reason we have sub judice laws in England.

However guilty Shanley is, there is no way he just got a fair trial.

ROB yes do you think the same thing will happen in the MJ trial if he is convicted ???? :)

Sick bar stewards.... evil

John, there is always a risk of the the jury pool being polluted when you have almost unfettered media reporting. However is th ecase of MJ, he is so famous in the first place and his 'wierdness' so widely reported, that even in England it would be difficult to find one person, let alone 12, who didn't know something of him.

Shanley is different, but for the hysterical reporting he would have had no public profile. Added to that, the prosecution evidence was extremely weak, indeed I personally would question whether their was sufficient to warrant the trial and some 'pundits' in Boston thought it would collapse before it started.

Given the weakness of the prosecution case, I can only surmise that the jury was influenced by the extraneous information, not just about Shanley, but the whole scandal. Shanley is one of only a minority of priests brought to trial at all add was effectively a lightening rod for all the anger that is very visble in Boston (including amongst Catholics who are watching as there churches and parochial schools are closed because the church has to fund a multi-million dollar settlement of the civil suits).

In most cercumstances ROB i think the *celeb status *helps the defendant more then the prosecution .
look at OJ any citizen with out celebrity status would have been found quilty with the evidence presented . i think money has a lot to do with it also look at the ramsey case we will never know what happened there and just recently the moxley =case was dug up and the police there seemed to not carry out a complete investigation owing to money and the * kenndy * connection .

On the other side of the coin i didnt think it fair that Kobe bryants name was flashed all over the press and the girl .accuser .....Katklyn kristine faber ...was keep secret .I thought the accused was * innocent until found quilty * so why was he treated diferantly by the press then her???

John, my take on this is that it is less to do with the celeb status of the defendants and more to do with money. Across America defendants are at a disadvantage. Whilst most Public Defenders are, contrary to public perception, very good, that is only half the story. PD's are grossly over worked and under resourced. It is often impossible for the defense to get independent verification of forensic evidence for example.

The prosecution know this and IMHO lower their game. Then along comes a rich defendant who can afford not only Johnny Cochrane but the entire panapoly that comes with him. They shred the prosecution case, which has been put together in the usual haphazard, slap dash manner and he gets off.

The OJ case is a classic example of a lazy incompetent, complacent prosecution getting a very rude awakening. To some extent Kobe Bryant was the same.

With Jackson it may be different - the prosecution has been here before and will presumably have prepared well. That said the prosecution case is total pants and if MJ is convicted it will be mostly because of the jury thinks he is so wierd he must be guilty of something.

If anything the celeb element or anything else that makes the case high profile works against the defendant because their character is usually so widely defamed in the media that there is no hope of a fair trial. Peterson for instance - he was found guilty because he was a total bar steward - the actual murder case was full of holes the size of the Mersey Tunnel - but no one cared about that.

OMG just yesterday a guy in our little town was busted! He took his CHILD PORN FILM to be developed at a local photo shop! No lie! He is a few years younger than me, I have known him for like 20 yrs. When I worked at the bookstore he would come in and by his gay porn at like 7am on a Sunday and try to mix it up with the NY Times. Always gave us the creeps.
THey've confisgated over 1000 items from his (moms) house. Webcams, hard drives, tapes, pictures the works.
The pictures that the rat bastard was trying to get developed had a child (boy) under the age of 13!!

Filthy pig.