Shamed Scottish judges

"It's not justice. It's shameful that it took five Justices in London to tell our judges how to do their job," says Ross.

Scottish academic Stuart Waiton, writing about this in The Spectator, describes the case as one of the most egregious examples of miscarriage of justice he has ever seen.

The other case dealt with by the UK Supreme Court involved David Daly, a man found guilty of historic child abuse. Excluded from the evidence presented to the jury was the fact that the complainant told police that the rape led to her getting pregnant and having a child – a claim which was found to be untrue. The defence was not allowed to question her about this fake pregnancy because it was not deemed relevant to the rape case. So, a bald lie used by an accuser to bolster her case is not relevant?

Early last year I wrote about Marc Catelli, a Sydney gelato salesman who was accused of sexual assault by a woman who had made similar accusations about two other men in the previous two years. He was facing a jury trial where the defence team was prohibited from mentioning these false allegations under NSW rape shield laws. Luckily Catelli's case was dropped – but only because the complainant failed to show up for various hearings.

NSW is the only Australian state/territory which prohibits evidence of previous false allegations. The state seems determined to remain a prime mover when it comes to ever more draconian rape laws. In 2022 NSW led recent moves to introduce affirmative or enthusiastic consent laws, which are proving very successful at having more men sent to prison.

Two weeks ago a man's post appeared on Reddit, warning men in Australia to learn from his mistakes. Here was a man who had just been released after serving a 2.9-year prison sentence for having sex without affirmative consent. His "victim" was a 43-year-old female he'd met on Tinder – he was 47 at the time. He invited her to his house, asking her on the phone to come over for sex "without strings."

"The one-night stand was nothing out of the ordinary. Lots of kissing, touching, normal sex. I grew up in an era of "No Means No". My victim never said "No" nor did she push me off," he wrote, explaining he assumed "everything was good," from the woman's positive reaction at the time.

But he's since learnt that wasn't good enough – he needed to check he had "positive and enthusiastic consent". That became very clear the next day, when a squad of six police officers came to his flat, unannounced: "busted down the door with a battering ram that cost me $5,000 to repair, and took evidence – sheets, condoms, clothes, etc."

"I was on remand in jail for close to a year, negotiating with the Department of Public Prosecutions and waiting for my trial, in horrible, smelly old jails full of roaches and scummy people. No fun at all."

At his trial he was lucky to escape with a sentence of only 2.9 years non-parole, 4.5 years in total.

His advice to other men – record everything and constantly check your partner is ok with everything you do. (Secret recording is not illegal unless it is played to a third party and can even legally be used in court to disprove evidence given against you.)

Since discovering the Reddit post I tracked down the shattered man – now facing the prospect that he will never again get a job in the banking industry which previously employed him. But putting his ordeal in perspective was the fact that while he was in prison his five-year-old son (from a previous relationship) was with his grandfather on the day of the Bondi Massacre. His brave grandfather used his body to successfully shelter the boy from the bullets.