h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Can I just say it's about damned time?

What worries me about Michael Jackson, is the previous incident. Whether or not he did it, as I understand a child who was quite old enough to be believed made an allegation. Before the matter was proved one way or the other in the proper way according to the laws of the land - the matter was dropped because MJ paid the boys father?

If a crime was comitted a crime was comitted, you can't pay a witness not to give evidence against you? well you can but it's illegal.

If it is a civil lawsuit, it is legal and called 'settling out of court'. If I remember correctly, this was a criminal case, but because the child refused to testify, the case was dropped due to lack of evidence.

California law has changed, in large part to what happened with the last incident. It used to be that a minor child could not be compelled to testify. That has changed. The child can be compelled to testify on closed circuit TV. And frankly, Z, as much as I hate to admit it, in the US, if you have enough money, you can buy your way out of almost anything.

See OJ Simpson's murder trial, the New Yorker who hacked a guy apart and was acquited, all sorts of cases. Kobe Bryant, the pro basketball player accused of rape, will also (in all likelihood) get off.

Are there cases like this in England?

We have paedophiles here Montana but I can't remember one as famous as the alleged Jackson. Like the US money buys a good lawyer in the UK.

Generally paedophiles are despised by the public and are hounded in and out of prison. The British are venomous about paedophilia.

maybe what is needed is M.J to be released into a room full of women with rusty knives in their possession. and now maybe some-one will take those poor three wee soles that he calls his children away from him and into a place of safety and in the hands of warm and loving people who will give them the normal upbrining they so desperately need and deserve

Yeah that is what would happen under "natural justice". Money deflects that.

well i know your right but no child should be denied the right of a loving and normal upbrining. Money cannot buy the children that

What was that inhuman man thinking of dangling that wee boy off that balcony and to drees them in masksit's beyond belief

Aye, but money buys protection for the perpetrators.
The alleged is protected by a private army.

I'd give him a private army alrighty back to the woman a rusty scaple and th urge to aireate his gonads

Michael Jackson will probably go bankrupt after this, whether he is prosecuted or not, because no record company or network will touch him. He'll have to sell Neverland. His children will be taken away from him. As he gets older his face will get scarier and scarier; I understand the tip of his nose is mostly unattached now.

So I am not particularly worried about retribution at this point, merely prevention of future occurrences.

Remember, he is "innocent until proven guilty". That said, he's such a freak it's very easy to believe the accusations...

Bryce, he got off last time for no good reason.

Oetzi, I thought we had this discussion, and I asked very nicely. Do I have to turn into a stark raving bi%^ch to get you to do what I asked? And yes, I know, this is a public space, but you know what? This journal is on *my* user page, and I distinctly recall asking you not to follow me any longer. I think being on my user page constitutes following, and I ask, again, that you desist. End of discussion.

Whether or not the man is guilty, paying a witness, in this case the key wittness to withdraw his or her allegations, surely has to be consirparcy to pervert the course of justice? Doesn't it?

I mean cases are Regina verus X, not Y verus Z. This was a criminal case not a civil case.

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Scarier? Is this possible???

az

azahar
You have a point there, but yes i think his face could get scarier! No face can take that ammount of surgery and remain intact

These allegations about Jackson have yet to be proved. What worries me is if he did do it, and gets away with it!! Its true what they say "money talks".

hmmmm . . .

http://www.guardian.co.uk/elsewhere/journalist/story/0,7792,1092649,00.html


az

az, very interesting, that. It used to be that a change of venue could be granted for excessive publicity in one area, but how can anyone get a fair trial in the digital age? The "excessive publicity" is global.

Then again, trying him on Mars might not be a bad idea. At least then he'd have a jury of his peers.

hi Montana,

Thought you might enjoy these.

http://terrisfp.com/michael/index.html


az

I know this might be an unpopular posting, but listen people, the basic tenent of all democratic judicial systems, is that you are innocent until proven guilty, no matter how much we may have prejudged the available evidence. If someone is obviously guilty, they still have the right to be defended in law until that right is suspended through provable culpability and guilt. That has not happened yet. If and when it does that would be the time to pronounce on sentencing, until then, let us be more than the Philistines, and
reserve judgement.