The Verdict on The Verdict: Incontinent or Not Guilty

Some more good critiques of 'The Verdict' appeared in the weekend papers. Unfortunately not all of which are available online. Hermione Eyre in The Independent's Sunday supplement cunningly entitled her piece 'A crass examination in court'. She judged it to have been somewhere between 'the ornament to BBC2' and the 'meretricious muck' it has variously been critiqued as being. She found the celebrity nature of the jury distracting and unhelpful and declared that Channel 4's effort in the same fictional rape-trial format, 'Consent' which it screened last month, was 'far more concise, restrained and powerful' than BBC2's Verdict. She maintained that it attracted less attention because of the non-celebrity jury in Consent. However, had C4s show been as heavily trailed as BBC2s affair then maybe it would have. It achieved the same effect, namely, exposed the prejudices that juries bring to their deliberations on the guilt or innocence of the accused. We didn't really need the knowledge of the celebrity's history, as BBC2's programme-makers reasoned we did on its programme's behalf, to see the prejudices at work. What does it matter how or who brings those prejudices - celebrity or not, they are plain to see and we realise they don't really serve justice well.

As it turned out, and if you don't want to know the score look away now..., the 'right' verdict was arrived at but by the wrong process, so let's not get complacent - as Euan Ferguson in The Observer noted:

"The shouting, the interruption, the absence of any kind of continence of thought: it was a Friday pub discussion gone horribly wrong, where the truth can be shouted down by the loudest."

Indeed. And that loudest was one Stanley Victor Collymore, famed for kicking a ball on the pitch and punching a bitch off the pitch.

'The EVIDENCE, the EVIDENCE you have to go off the EVIDENCE....' he barracked and harangued not realising that the witness statements and demeanour are just as much evidence as DNA and pubic hairs. In the final analysis, the physical evidence proved as inconclusive as the personal testimonies.

And therein lies the rub. As various commenters over at the BBC Points of View Verdict messageboard have asked 'how exactly do you prove rape?' Any DNA evidence may only prove that sex took place not whether it was consensual or not. Many on the jury felt that something terrible had befallen the woman in question but that the evidence wasn't there to make them "sure", as the judge directed, on the various charges.

As for the celebrities: Michael Portillo brought a calming and procedural influence though seemed a tad weak in leadership at times, Jeffrey Archer was just cringeworthy , Stan Collymore was "a brute". The 'star' of the show was Dominic McVey, a young entrepreneur, who brought intelligence, respect and responsibilty at the tender age of 21.

The last word on the show went to Honor Blackman who ruefully ruminated into the camera at the end that maybe one had just let rapists walk free "But", she said "..that's the jury system."

Read all about it....
The Sunday Mirror on The Verdict - "startlingly tasteless"
How can juries understand rape unless the full horror is explained to them?
The prejudices that allow rapists to go free.
More links to reviews here and here