I am no expert in the realm of tort law.
I believe that in Virginia, the privilege you mention applies only to communications made in proceedings pending in a court or before a quasi-judicial body. See Penick v. Ratcliffe, 149 Va. 618, 628 (1927).
I welcome correction on this point.
The first and third links Peter Wiggin provided are ones I had read before posting this.
I’m also friendly with some of the criminal lawyers who practice in the Charlottesville area, and some of my information came from them. Nothing I was told, though, has not also been reported in print.
In short, the links already posted have sufficient information, I think.
Couple points came in while I was typing (why didn’t I preview)
The test is “what would a reasonable person do in similar circumstances.” No special expertise required - legal enforcement or aural or otherwise.
We don’t have all the facts here. Based on the facts I’ve read, I would tend to agree that the victim is not liable here. But that’s why we have lawsuits.
We can’t answer the question here “Should she pay?” But we can answer this: Do you agree with Prof. Anne M. Coughlin who believes these lawsuits are ill-advised because they scare off other victims. In other words, the question isn’t “Should she pay?” it’s “Should she be sued?” If the case is tried and she was found to have made an honest mistake any of us would have made - she should not pay.
In fact, if Matthew brought the case to actual trial in the face of pre-trial discoveries that should have pursuaded him there was no actual case, then Matthew should pay the victim for putting her through a frivolous lawsuit.
But if the merits of the case warrant, the lawsuit should be heard. There should be a price to pay if you recklessly or intentionally accuse someone falsely.
Does the victim have ANY duty of care towards someone she accuses? Or should she have absolutel immunity with respect to any accusation she makes?
If she does have a duty of care – what is it?
Her duty of care is simply that she honestly believe she identified the right guy.
Witnesses and victims have identified suspects on less than what this woman had to go on and they don’t get accused of recklessness. Charles Lindbergh identified Bruno Hauptman’s voice as belonging to his son’s kidnapper based solely on a three year old memory of a single sentence shouted in the dark. Was Lindbergh reckless? Does this kind of testimony not happen constantly?
Going to the police and reporting a crime is not slander so these two situations aren’t alike.
Is it really a victim’s responsibility to go and look at the various studies about eyewitness reliability? All she has to go on is her feeling and memory. If she thinks she is certain that this man raped her then she should say so. It should be the job of the police or the DA to evaluate her testimony and decide whether it is valid. They are (presumably) trained in evaluating the reliability of testimony and the onus is on them to ensure they have proper information before proceeding.
You have to ask yourself here, what action is the action that damaged Mr. Matthew. Is it a victim who had been raped identifying someone, that I might add was being arrested for the crime at the time, who she believed raped her. Or is it the police using testimony that they ought to know is unreliable in order to arrest someone? Isn’t the repsonsibilty of the police to have more than eyewitness testimony to arrest someone?
And who should decide if she honestly believed she identified the right guy?
Supposed information? Yesh thats pretty weak.
Anyways, from here
Sept. 3rd was a Saturday, typically college students walking home from parties on Saturday’s do so at nighttime and after consuming alcohol.
A judge and/or jury. Maybe the facts of the case at hand do not warrant a trial. But is it not conceivable that a person honestly believes so and so did it but had no right to that belief? If my house was burgled and my betamax was stolen, do I have the right to accuse Metacom because look beta/meta sounds so much alike? That’s unreasonable. You should have a means to reclaim the damages I inflicted on you because of my unreasonableness.
I agree with everyone here that a mere accusation does not a lawsuit warrant. But if there is reason for the one falsely accused to believe that his being fingered was not an honest mistake, then should he not have the right to the damages flowing from someone’s unreasonableness - someone’s negligence? Are those that are arguing with me saying there is no such case, or merely that this case doesn’t warrant it, based on a couple links and the contents of this thread alone?
If her attacker was a 4’10" 98 pound Asian man, and Matthew is a 6’7" 300 lb African American man, can we agree that it’s objectively unreasonable for her to have honestly held that belief?
Note: this is a hypothetical extreme. I’m not saying that is an actual description of either the attacker or Mr. Matthew.
Of course not. That fails the reasonable person test. But would a reasonable person say “I’m just not sure” if (if if if if if) the headlights did not reveal a good view of the suspect?
I’m not letting the cops off the hook in this case either: They held this guy for five days! They could have held him long enough to take the DNA sample, then the next day place him in a line up. If the victim still fingers the guy - then the reasonable person test is met.
Nor am I letting Matthew off the hook: $850,000 even though he was exonerated? What actual damage to his reputation did he endure?
Again, I concede: if we were the jury and we were presented only with was appeared in this thread, I’d say verdict for the defendant - no liability, no damages.
But a jury can’t render a verdict unless there’s a trial. Should this case be tried in a court other than the SDMB? I say it should. (and if the plaintiff’s case is so weak he should be made to pay the defendant’s costs). If you disagree with this principle, why?
So, what about the point that she told the officers she had not been raped, and then changed her mind (claiming she HAD been raped) only after identifying the guy?
That’s his allegation, of course, and is not established fact. But, that’s a crucial part of this whole case. Do we know for certain that she was actually raped? What about the cops-- shouldn’t they have been at least somewhat skeptical of this woman if she changed her story?
Too many unknowns. I don’t see how you can claim the cops acted appropriately w/o knowing more than is given in the articles.
I can’t get this Eric Clapton song out of my head:
“Before you accuse me, take a look at yourself…”
If there was DNA evidence, doesn’t that strongly suggest that she was raped? My understanding is that such evidence generally consists of semen; certainly if they were gathering DNA evidence, the lack of semen would indicate that she’d not been raped, wouldn’t it?
Bricker, I’m not sure even in your hypothetical that we can conclude the woman was acting recklessly. If the attack happened in the dark, then she could have gotten confused. A rape is one of the most emotionally traumatic things that happens to folks; I’m not sure it makes sense to require rape victims to act in a reasonable manner immediately after the crime.
Absent compelling evidence that she intentionally misled police, or evidence that she decided to behave recklessly (e.g., telling a friend, “I’m sick of this investigation, so I’m just going to point the finger at the next suspect the police bring along”), I say this case shouldn’t go forward. Bring criminal charges if there’s evidence of recklessness or misleading behavior; but the power it places in the hands of the accused seems pretty scary to me, making the victim’s plight be even worse.
Consider from her perspective: she’s attacked and raped. The police point out someone to her that she thinks is the rapist, so she at least has the relief that her attacker is behind bars. Then she finds out that they caught the wrong guy, so her attacker is on the streets still. How much sense does it make to tell her that she may be financially ruined for being mistaken about who raped her?
Daniel
I don’t know but again I don’t think it matters. Mr. Matthew was harmed by the police arresting him and the DA charging him with a crime. That power is soley the polices and the DAs. The responsibility that comes with that power soley rests on their shoulders. They ought to know that a rape victim fingering a suspect as they arrest him for the crime is simply not reliable. Its them who have damaged Mr. Matthew not the victim.
Well, we have a University of Virginia female law student so we are most likely dealing with a white person here and the suspect in this case is a black male. Historically in this country that has not been a recipe for justice. Just sayin’ is all.
Exactly.
There are plenty of ways to get the attacker’s DNA from a victim that don’t involve semen.
Skin under her fingernails from scratching the attacker, blood, hair, saliva etc.
I can’t see a rational reason to deny rape at first, then claim it when accusing someone later, but she might have not been a particularly rational state at the time.
I though we were talking about recklessness, which she should be held liabile for.
If it was semen, it would strongly suggest that she had sex. Not that she was raped. Other evidence would have to back up the claims of coercion.
You answered the question as if it was rhetorical, but it wasn’t.
Do you not see any situations where it would be clear that the woman was in the wrong?
For example, suppose a woman is raped. She identifies Bill, her 6’ 3" black ex-husband with whom she had a very ugly divorce. The DNA evidence points to Tom, a 3’ 8" white midget who smells strongly of goat. She swears up and down that she got a good look at her attacker, and she beleived in good faith that it was Bill.
Should she still get a pass, or should this one go to a jury?
If her attacker was a 4’10" 98 pound Asian man, and Matthew is a 6’7" 300 lb African American man, can we agree that it’s objectively unreasonable for her to have honestly held that belief?