Rape Case Solved By Anonymous in Less Than 2 Hours Despite "No Evidence" | Hacker News Reader

Rape Case Solved By Anonymous in Less Than 2 Hours Despite "No Evidence"

policymic.com

87 pointscolinismyname63 comments

This case is getting a large amount of attention on blogs, but as usual blogs are not the most reliable source of information.

It may be true that it took some individuals calling themselves "Anonymous" two hours to discover the identities of the youth who had sex with Rehtaeh Parsons. While Canadian law prohibits the publication of identities of youth accused of crimes (on the basis that youthful indiscretions, even of a serious criminal nature, should not follow perpetrators for their entire lives), it's not all that difficult to find someone who knows someone who knows who was involved.

The police also knew exactly who was involved, and have known for over a year.

The "lack of evidence" referred to by police was not a lack of evidence of who was involved, but rather a lack of sufficient evidence that the sexual encounter was criminal. Even if they believed that Rehtaeh Parsons had been raped, the bar for laying criminal charges is "significant likelihood of conviction", and the bar for conviction is "proven beyond a reasonable doubt" -- and where the alleged victim does not make a complaint until after facing bullying for what her peers were presuming was consensual, it can easily raise doubts as to her veracity.

(The lesser issue, of producing and distributing child pornography, was the opposite: Clearly an offence had occurred, and they knew whose phone was used; but they had no way to prove which of three suspects was responsible.)

As far as I can tell, the police and prosecutors were entirely correct in their investigation and analysis of the situation. The only officials who did not do their jobs were the school administrators who failed to prevent or stop the bullying which Rehtaeh Parsons was subjected to, and the mental health workers who failed to take Rehtaeh Parsons's suicide threats seriously enough.

Do you have any sources for this:

"The police also knew exactly who was involved, and have known for over a year. The "lack of evidence" referred to by police was not a lack of evidence of who was involved, but rather a lack of sufficient evidence that the sexual encounter was criminal. "

You do seem trustworthy, I would just like to verify and read more.

Yes, straight from the RCMP's mouth: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=at3XG-4ftF8#t=2m

"There were insufficient evidence to proceed to charges."

That Youtube link is a video of a RCMP officer being interviewed on air.

Question 1: If drunk boys have sex with drunk girl, is it rape? Who raped who? Some news sites claim that the boys say that the girl _wanted_ to have sex.

Question 2: how can minors get access to liquor?

Answer 1: If they are sufficiently intoxicated as to be unable to consent, then yes, it is rape. In such a case all the individuals involved could theoretically be charged and convicted -- it is possible to have "mutual rape".

Answer 2: In decreasing order of probability: Fake ID, older friends/relatives, theft.

"Even if they believed that Rehtaeh Parsons had been raped"

She was under the age of consent, legally there is zero doubt it was rape. Edit: Apparently under Canadian law it may not have been statutory rape.

Edit: Also, apparently she was vomiting whilst being assaulted[1]. I'd like to meet the lawyer who could convince a jury that consent was given.

[1] "One of the boys snapped a picture on his mobile phone of Rehtaeh vomiting while allegedly being assaulted." http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/the-search-for-...

No she wasn't. Do you even understand Canadian law? The age of consent is 14, if the other partner is within 5 years of age. Her classmates at the party would have been, presumably, within 5 years of age.

Source: http://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/dept-min/clp/faq.html "The Criminal Code provides "close in age" or "peer group" exceptions.

For example, a 14 or 15 year old can consent to sexual activity with a partner as long as the partner is less than five years older and there is no relationship of trust, authority or dependency or any other exploitation of the young person."

Edit to address your Edit: Because after having a lot of drinks at a party ('drunk'), and then having what could be considered strenuous physical activity (i.e. sex) would not induce vomiting if it wasn't rape, right? Look, I'm not at all condoning what the 4 male youth have done, but let's still use logic in our discussions.

Further Edit: Also I just want to add, unlike other Commonwealth Nations (e.g. Britain), the Canadian legal system does NOT allow extra charges to be tacked on while the legal proceedings are in motion. So before the RCMP and Crown Prosecutors initiate prosecutorial charges, they need to be relatively certain that they have enough evidence to win as they stand currently. They can't just say "Hey, I charge you with X with evidence Y, Z. Let's go to court." Then 5 days later say "and also A with evidence B, C."

Not to be unnecessarily argumentative but do you think a jury would be convinced by that 'she was throwing up due to strenuous exercise' excuse?

I don't know. Honestly, I don't. I think it seriously would come down to what context that issue was brought up, how good the prosecution is vs. the defense attorneys (both supplied by the Crown, presumably. Unless one or more of the accused male youths are wealthy enough to obtain his own legal counsel), and how the issue is presented to the judge and jury.

But I can certainly seeing it played to the accused favour by the counsel saying something along the lines of: "She was drunk enough that during consensual intercourse, she threw up."

Thereby sidelining that issue for pretty much the rest of the trial. Even if it's ever brought up again, in the Jury's minds, it wouldn't necessarily have the negative connotation that you're envisioning.

Maybe it's different in Canada but in the UK being that drunk would be very strong evidence that you were in no state to give consent. If you have sex with someone who's so drunk they don't know what they're doing that's rape.

In Canada, there is certainly a point where intoxication makes people unable to legally consent. Presumably the police and/or prosecutors felt there was not sufficient evidence of that level of intoxication.

She was vomiting in the photo, that's pretty good evidence of that level of intoxication. The accused was also clearly recognisable[1] in the photo so it beggars belief that they could think there wasn't sufficient evidence.

[1] “because he is easily recognizable in a photograph showing him raping the victim while she is visibly ill… why the RCMP decided these photographs aren’t evidence of rape is beyond us.” http://www.salon.com/2013/04/12/anonymous_on_rehtaeh_parsons...

Vomiting certainly does increase the Bayesian likelihood that she was intoxicated; whether it is enough to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that she was intoxicated to the point of being unable to consent is a different question. I have not, of course, seen the photo in question, nor do I know what witness statements may have indicated.

I'm not saying that Rehtaeh Parsons was not raped; only that when the police and prosecutors say that they do not think they could secure a conviction, I'm inclined to trust their expertise and knowledge of the case.

Well, what if both were drunk? Then who raped whom? Keeping aside the widely accepted stereotype that only men can rape women.

PS. A generic question. Not related to the crime mentioned in OP.

In USA everything can be rape, even consensual sex between two 17 y/o teenagers. So please don't talk like this was or had to be universal or something. Nobody is a child until 18, and then magically become an adult when law makers say so. I'm proud to say that 15-17 years old girls can be hot, and I can feel attracted to them.

What an upstanding member of society you must be.

Makes me wonder whether HN could use a function to auto hell ban certain usernames (could be tough to find out which, but 'throwaway*' seems like a good start - I have yet to see one contribute value to a discussion).

At first read of your comment, I thought you were referring to analog as the user to hellban, not throwawayG9 (who, by the way, is a 60 day old account). In my opinion, throwawayG9 did contribute something very valuable to this discussion, which is pointing out the irrationality of how we view sex in the first place. The ad hominon attackk against this position that refuses to acknoledge the possibility that we might view sex irrationally, and says that anyone who thinks so must be a bad member of society seems far less productive to a conversation.

Yes, I particularly find that part interesting where he/she goes on to say that we become adults right when the mid-night clock ticks after 17 years, 364 days and 23:59 hours[^] of our lives.

[^]PS. No maths please.

"I'm proud to say that 15-17 years old girls can be hot, and I can feel attracted to them."

throwawayG9 is stating that they are proud to be a paedophile. Personally I'd feel a little wrong about dating an 18 year old girl, but a 15 year old girl is most definitely a child.

Wow, how convenient that your sexual insticts matche the law of the very country you happen to live in. That way you won't feel a slave of the system, that commands you what to do, what to think, and how to feel.

Though I wonder if you would be able to tell whether you like a girl before knowing her age. That would be an interesting experiment, and you would probably learn something about yourself.

Okay, please don't crucify me for this, but when I was in college (3rd year ~22 yrs old) I'd met a girl at a mall and I was attracted towards her. She was a friend's sister's(a bit younger than us) friend who used to hang around with us and she looked nothing less than 19(or well, 20 I'd have said). We went coffee twice(first) and and a film in the next week.

Then one day we were walking along a park(like the one in societies - the tiny ones with few trees/plants and little fountain - not as in "park" park) and she tried to hug me and tried reach a bit higher - at 5'11" I was a bit higher for her and as it was a bit too fast I just pecked her on cheek and we sat down.

There was sth amiss abut her, she didn't seem what she was. Looked she was hiding sth. As at times she would be like so mature and at times she would be excited at things only an early teen would be but I took the sign as "full of life". We said good bye that day.

The other day I met that friend's sister so I asked her "hey that friend of yours..from your college(she has just joined college - 1st yr)".. she replied.."no, she isn't..we know each other 'cause we play volleyball at our local team together"... and then I said(a little blushing) "ok..well... because we know we are sort of dating..not dating but sort of".. there was another friend sitting there.. and then came the bomb.. She laughed and punched me playfully and said.."hey..weirdoo.. she a fg kid.. she is class 11...she is bloody 15-16..stay away from her..you paedo.....:-)".. And I was like - wtf!! Of course a bit ashamed and scared too!

Anyway, that ended there. She never called me and I never did either. Maybe friend's sister talked to her. But where was my fault? I mean I genuinely felt attracted to her and trust me there was no way I could have known! And no, after knowing it never came to my mind that I should pursue it further but I never actually felt that I wronged* her. Because I didn't!

That "me" was a friend of mine and that another friend was actually me. We still tease that friend and call him "paedo". I guess he avoids looking at (relatively) younger females when we are around :-)

.. >>throwawayG9 is stating that they are proud to be a paedophile.

He is not a paedophile just for this! It' a very normal reaction and the line paedophilia comes where to stop or where's that line! I mean I've talked to many people and they feel it too! But we don't approach them and don't look at then sleazily. I've come across instance where those, I dare say quite attractive school kids usually from rich families have approached me/us at bars and pubs (for a dance/chat/whatever) and many times at liquor shops to help them buy it(they often want whiskey and vodka..damn).. we usually tease them a little..like "how old are you".. how much you get score in maths/any-sub..blah..."are you a good student".. and then usually tell them to get the fk out of there or offer them let the nearby copper know whether she could buy a bottle herself!

>>Personally I'd feel a little wrong about dating an 18 year old girl, but a 15 year old girl is most definitely a child.

That is where the drawing a line comes into picture. BTW, how old are you? I would not mind dating a 18 yr old girl when when I am even 22-23. But I would sure not do it with a 15 yr old even when I am 19-20, even though the age differences are same!

"refuses to acknoledge the possibility that we might view sex irrationally"

Yes, I think it's wrong to have sex with children. And to be 'proud' of wanting to.

Just to clarify - I wasn't addressing you with the hellban call (I know you know, but, you know, other people).

And to further agree - I think "well, what can I do, they're hot!" (or its buddy "hey, what do you know - they might like it!") or any sort of that nonsense is the absolute maximum height of the shittiest relativistic thinking that humans are capable of.

Yes, laws can be complicated and yes any particular cutoff age is inherently bullshit. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't have it. Know why? Because it saves a whole lot of human beings from having their life ruined beyond repair, forever, by a guy who can't keep his dick in his pants. It's worth the bullshit. If you don't see that, you're simply an inconsiderate asshole.

And if you hide behind a throwaway (others pointed out it's 60 days old, so what, its probably your bogstandard reddit user branching over to HN, liking his new platform to spew idiocy), this site should hell ban the shit out of you.

Sorry about the rant. Relativistic bullshit pisses me off to no end. Especially if it's by frigging neckbeards who apparently think anything in the world should revolve around their ability to fuck whatever they think is "hot". Get a life.

(again, not really directed at you, analog)

That anyone would celebrate what is essentially a case of vigilante mob justice is extremely disturbing.

What rules of evidence do Anonymous have to follow? Who holds them accountable?

Law enforcement's hands are often tied for extremely good reasons. Occasionally that means cases can't be investigated as thoroughly as they ought to be, but the alternative is worse.

It's not 'mob justice' to collect evidence. The article does not speak about Anonymous punishing the actors, only on the amount of witness testimony and other evidence that they found.

According to Canadian laws, and the laws of many other societies, even accusing a juvenile of a criminal offense is essentially considered punishment since it will color their future regardless of whether or not they are acquitted. That is one of many reasons why we have separate legal frameworks for juvenile offenders.

So, assuming the police have one set of suspects, and they are all juveniles under the law and a lack of sufficient evidence, this is nothing more than a mob's attempt to railroad the accused.

As another commenter posted above: see how you feel about "Anonymous justice" when you are in their cross-hairs.

And if they publicly accused someone of it, it would be wrong. But the article explicitly states that they didn't announce anything publicly, and only claim to have gathered evidence and requested the investigation to be reopened.

What rules do they have to follow? It sounds like they were contacted by the witnesses.

How does a witness contact anonymous? And how do "anonymous" even verify that these witnesses are legitimate?

Just reads like a bunch of people wanting to do "something" about this and a bunch of other people trolling them (i.e. giving them false leads etc).

If I were to hazard a guess, it probably had to do with the fact that the 'suspects' in this case were all minors, and perhaps the RCMP has access to fewer avenues of investigation without any hard evidence, and the judge/magistrate would most likely not as easily grant any sort of search warrant as easily due to the suspects being minors.

I'm from Canada, and the police are generally very much cuffed at the hands when it comes to dealing with minors. Just look at the Vancouver 2011 riot. It took the RCMP over a year even with all the picture/video evidences before they could legally bring any sort of charges against a lot of the younger perpetrators.

Where's the mob justice part?

Law enforcement is given strong shackles because of the power they (the government) has. These same controls are not applied to the general populous.

The police can not break into your house if they believe you have evidence of a crime. If he does, evidence found can not be used against you. Your neighbor on the other hand, can. He can also take that evidence to the police and they can use it in that case. Now, he may also be charged with a crime, but that evidence can be used against you.

"If he does, evidence found can not be used against you. Your neighbor on the other hand, can. He can also take that evidence to the police and they can use it in that case. Now, he may also be charged with a crime, but that evidence can be used against you."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exclusionary_rule#Limitations_o...

Hrm, interesting.

However, your neighbor breaking in is trespassing. You can press charges against him or even (in many countries) defend your property by force. You can't really do that against cops.

Right. But you still go to jail for the murder.

Anonymous didn't solve anything by identifying the alleged rapists. Nothing I have read suggests that Canadian law enforcement didn't know who the suspects were. They simply did not file charges. We don't know why exactly they didn't file charges, but for some reason they determined there was no case.

It seems to me what anonymous was saying is that isn't good enough. Also that the identities of the assailants would become available eventually with or without any help.

This is an awful story. One thing that seems glaringly obvious: the police does NOT need additional snooping powers on the Internet - they simply have to learn to use what's already available. Yet, politicians will likely soon claim that they need more such power that anonymous supposedly have.

Asking the police to deliver Anonymous-style justice seems ill-advised. We have due process for a reason.

Emperor Harper doesn't need a reason to increase Federal censorship and policing powers. He does it fine all by his lonesome already.

If anyone is curious, read Michael Geist's (http://www.michaelgeist.ca/) blog for more details and intelligent commentary on the political details regarding current Canadian digital rights/copyright/surveillance schmucks that Emperor Harper and his Goon Cabinet are hatching up.

Emperor Harper? Goon Cabinet? Is Reddit leaking or something? What a bunch of crap. You know Michael Geist had a ton of very positive things to say about C-11 [1], right? You didn't want to link directly to that commentary, though. I wonder why?

[1] - http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/6695/99999/

Perhaps you need a refresher. When Bill C-11 was introduced, it was a CARBON COPY of Bill C-32, of which Mr. Geist did not give a very flattering review at all: http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/6031/125/

How about this piece: "In other words, virtually every education group and provincial education minister in Canada - along with major businesses and retailers - have joined with librarians, archivists, and documentary film makers to oppose the government's position on digital locks."

So, in other words, even their corporate business overlords thought their puppet underlying Harper & Goon Co. were over acting.

It was after a lot of petitioning and citizen activism that the amendments to the bills were made enough so that it was passed. I even petitioned my MP, so I'd consider myself part of the solution. To be fair, Emperor Harper at least had the decency to not shove it down everyone's throat, though he very easily could have done so with a majority party.

And Reddit? Seriously? I don't even go on that filth of a site, so please, why don't you go back to "The Frontpage of the Internet" (or whatever the heck they brand themselves these days)?

It is unclear to me why you think a criticism of a bill at introduction should outweigh praise of the same bill at adoption. Do you understand how legislation is made? Have you heard of political process? Here is a refresher: someone proposes a bill, people debate it, changes are made and incorporated into the bill. This cycle repeats a few times (usually 3). Then a final vote is held. If the yeas overwhelm the nays, the bill passes. Otherwise, the bill fails.

After going through this process, C-11 (which was absolutely NOT a carbon copy of anything in its final form) passed. Michael Geist then wrote the piece I linked explaining why there were a lot of great provisions in bill C-11.

You sound like a teenager who has just learned to rebel against his parents' political views. The nickname "Harper & Goon Co." is not part of a reasonable discussion of Canadian politics. Your points don't make any sense.

Let's see how satisfied you are with Anonymous' 2-hour justice process when you are the accused.

The most tragic part of the story is that it took a suicide for anyone to care.

Unfortunately, that is very commonly the case (Aaron Swartz).

I remember the original thread that Aaron posted to HN asking for help when his legal problems began. The replies were mostly unsympathetic.

This article gives the wrong idea and doesn't have many specifics... following a couple links I found this page:

http://www.inquisitr.com/613702/rehtaeh-parsons-case-solved-...

Which includes the Anonymous video. Should clear up a lot of questions.

Edit: Submitted that link as a separate article: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5544835

If Anons truly received a flood of testimony after posting on some forums, law enforcement must have pretty much actively avoided hearing testimony.

The photo/video-sharing aspect of this case is particularly interesting; not analyzing available data from the internet (or simply not even knowing photos/video pertaining to the case are being widely distributed) is likely going to be a focal point, but heightened law enforcement use of evidence from the digital domain is probably touchy for many of the same Anons that contributed to this.

Original Anonymous Statement on Pastebin: http://pastebin.com/Q8VWUy7a

Well I don't like all this for several reasons.

Whoever are working hard to bring justice, it seems like it's for glory of anonymous, because now she's dead, it's like "oh this was real then, it has gain attention, etc".

I like how anon can do good things, but I don't really like the fact that courts are fucked enough so than internet is the last common sense around here. It's like emotion driving the case. It's not really sane.

I would not like to let justice be handled by an internet group is all, to see become the mob or whatever thing.

When society is stupid to let those bastards go, society does an error, and it's responsible for it in a way. You can't always kick evil in the nuts and act like a superhero.

Even if those guys go to jail, it's still sad she's dead, but at least that will teach other people to have more courage to make justice happen more quickly.

I really want some more details here

The Globe and Mail (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/) among other national Canadian papers are covering this story extensively. Be forewarned the details are to me very disturbing - both of the incident and subsequent treatment of the victim, but also of the official response which the article covers.

Yep. For example, why did those people who know the rapists or had the photos apparently not give them to the police before? Or did the case that Anonymous built actually work out in the end?

The police had the photos and knew who the accused rapists were.

An article I read said that the police knew whose phone the photo was taken off of, but that they didn't want to arrest anyone because they didn't know whose finger pressed the button to actually take it. Just mind-boggling that despite an alleged rape with photo evidence, they wouldn't arrest anyone for distribution of child pornography because they couldn't prove who took the picture. If no one wanted to fess up to it, either let the phone owner take the fall or make them all responsible.

"Just mind-boggling that despite an alleged rape with photo evidence, they wouldn't arrest anyone for distribution of child pornography because they couldn't prove who took the picture. If no one wanted to fess up to it, either let the phone owner take the fall or make them all responsible."

Primary school is not law.

Right, because all of them were innocent to begin with.

I fully agree with the horror of their actions and complicity.

It's just a bit more complicated and serious than "Who threw the spitball? You're all guilty until one of you fesses up!"

The case may be getting lots of attention however it indicates that one thing is clear: people are losing faith in government-funded social support structures.

Law enforcement agencies are being lambasted time and again (whether it's valid criticism or not is irrelevant), and they continue to ignore claims of how ineffectual they are. Someone needs to stand up and say "We are here for you and we support you" otherwise it stands to reason that there are dangerous undertones forming.

Cost-cutting policies are continuing to erode our faith in institutions that exist to help and assist us in times of need, and it's becoming painfully clear people are thinking they have nowhere else to turn. Social services actively look for ways to avoid helping people, and they actively discourage people from turning to them.

The libertarian in me finds is absolutely wonderful that people are realizing they need to become self-sufficient but it's frightening as well.

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They made a pretty striking case that the police exhibited gross negligence, I suppose. Although they didn't do it in a way that has the weight of law behind it, they did succeed in getting the case reopened.

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