That is by no means the only answer. Another answer, for example, would be for everyone to internalize the basic principle of not raping your fellow crewmember.

We'll never know if there's enough evidence.

Complainant chooses not to pursue a criminal case, avoiding the only appropriate venue.

#metoo is encouraging people to avoid using the proper venue, rather than highlighting any problems that should be fixed with it and encouraging others to insist it must work.

#courtsfailedme would be much more useful, but far less topical and marketable.

We're left proposing justice by popularity.

Most of us left that behind in the school playground.

Ugh.

If only it were that simple, and every man accused of Rape was actually a "Rapist".

Many lives have been ruined, not just in Aviation, due to drunken one night stands and the regret that follows. In the modern world, a Women is unable to give "Consent" if intoxicated but an Erection seems to be all is required on the Man's behalf. As such, if both parties are intoxicated, the Rapist and the Victim are decided along gender lines.

This is not to say that many men haven't coerced women into sex while intoxicated, but that the definition of Rape has become blurred in recent times. A women who drives drunk is responsible for her actions, but a women who has sex while intoxicated was unable to give consent and was thus raped? That's the narrative these days.

I might sound like a misogynistic bastard to some, but I witnessed the devastation first hand many years ago. While on a layover, a Flight Attendant was very clearly on the prowl and had her eyes on a colleague of mine, she'd enquired with us as to his availability during the flight, wasn't shy about her intentions in the Galley, and we all saw her drag him off during the night.

When word back to her husband, the accusations came out. No amount of witness statements from us or her colleagues, even though they prevented prosecution, could undo the damage done by accusation.

I don't pretend that Women aren't overly represented when it comes to sexual assaults nor how difficult it can be for them to come forward, there are plenty of pigs in this world who should be castrated. But I also don't pretend that People don't lie about Crimes, not just Rape, for a variety of nefarious reasons.

The percentage of False vs Legitimate accusations is irrelevant. The fact that People do lie forces to authorities to do a thorough investigation, which is extremely difficult in cases of "Date rape" without any toxicology evidence.

It's a sad world we live in. :yuk:
Slam-Click seeya tomorrow.

Cynical Sid says it all

No.

This #meetoo movement is to encourage women to speak up about sexual assault/harassment.
Victims that would have done nothing about it otherwise.
Really, if all of them could simply write #meetoo as status, we would understand the magnitude of the problem.

Once knowing that, you start to fixe it and that’s what is more or less happening.

#MeToo is about bypassing the inconvenience of proving your allegation. No more, no less.

It either:

Allows evil rapists to continue at large, when they should be locked away.

Or

It ruins the lives of innocent men.

Either way. Both victims, and women in general, would be far better served reporting their allegations to the police.

"…an airline captain that drugs his copilot a few hours before they are due to fly …"

Yes, I thought that that was extremely bizarre. And very dangerous, unless he planned to dob her, or get someone else to dob her pre-flight.

I've been a naughty boy in my time, but that seems an awful lot of risk-taking just for a shag (and with a semi-conscious woman at that).

A man who would do that sort of thing would be bound to have built up a reputation as an ass-grabber to be avoided, I would have thought.

Did he have such a reputation? Were there any prior "incidents"?

Just asking.

Mac

:ouch:

e
surely...unless she was in shock and intimidated by the undoubtedly severe consequences ...and unable to process all this in a few days because shes human and her entire professional life hangs in the balance.

gimmie a break.

your politics is showing.

back in the day my airline, (which was absorbed by Delta) reacted to any sort of sexism related complaint with alacrity and alarm. It was rare, but it happened, and the few pilots who found themselves so charged were in big trouble from the get go.

Alaska has taken a different approach. Considering the social climate today, this is surprising, and If I had to guess, untenable.

I cannot recall one company standing firm against a "sexism" challenge of any kind in the past several years. Maybe I'm wrong, but I predict a quick turnabout by Alaska. I wouldn't want to be this guy.

Or girl. No matter the outcome. I cant imagine why either him or her would rationally choose to endanger their career in this way.

Both are talented professionals with a lot to lose.

additionally, the hotel videos as portrayed in the media are certainly not evidence of a rape, but they are troubling for him if the description is accurate, as are the accounts of the events surrounding their removal from the flight.

You could say essentially the same thing about virtually anyone accused of a crime. "I can't imagine why XXX would rationally choose to endanger thier (Career,/freedom from incarceration/reputation/personal wealth/etc, etc, etc) in this way. Yet, people do things every day whcih cause them to lose their personal freedom, careers, savings accounts, families, community standing. That line of reasoning really sheds no meaningful light on whether or not someone committed some act whcih might bring grave consequences.


Have you seen the hotel videos? I haven't. all I have seen is a description of what the FO has claimed someone else told her was in the video.

This lawsuit is about workplace rape.
Airlines have good lawyers and they'll put up a fight.
Is a crew hotel a workplace? That's for the court to decide.
In other words, were they on the job?

I think you’ll find, if you are traveling on company business, occupying a company-arranged and paid lodging, it’s a work place occurrence.

Airlines will only fight, if its in their interest to do so. Defending someone who the evidence shows may have raped or, even had questionable sex with, isn’t in their interest.

GF

disregard.

you might note the qualifiers in my reference to the videos. I didn't say anything about their accuracy.

yes, Im aware people do crazy things. that WAS the point. one of these two has done just that.

I predict they fold like a plastic lawn chair

Meet the Brash and Brilliant Lawyer Who Won?t Leave Ed Murray Alone | Seattle Weekly

There have been a string of failed prosecutions for rape in the UK that have collapsed because the police failed to disclose evidence to the defence that proved beyond all reasonable doubt that the woman had consented. Mainly posts after the event on social media.

Under UK law the accused is identified but the alleged victim has anonymity: even after the case has collapsed. In some cases it took two years for the case to be dismissed. Not hard to imagine what the accused went through in the meantime.

Yes, rape is an appalling crime, and should be prosecuted. But some women lie. The fundamental principle of innocent until proven guilty should still apply. At the moment, at least in the UK, there seems to be a presumption that if rape is alleged a crime was commited: to the extent the police will bend the rules of evidence to secure a prosecution.

This attitude extends (at least in my industry) to the response to claims of sexual harassment in the workplace. You have to prove you didn’t do it, the presumption is you did.

So maybe he did, maybe he didn’t. But if he didn’t, does he deserve the treatment he is getting?

The pendulum has swung to far in favour of the woman.

Yeah, I was more making the point generally. There can be a tendency to accept things at face value. Honestly, I briefly fell into this trap myself as the story emerged. The first article I read was pretty bare bones, just the broad details, and my though were more or less "Hmmm, He/said she said". The next article I read had all or most of the details we now see before and because of the way it was written, and perhaps because I wasn't reading carefully enough, it seemed like they had a lot of pretty damning evidence in terms of witness statements and surveillance video, and I shifted to "Hmm sounds like he may have done more or less what was alleged" Then when this popped up here, I re-read the article a little more carefully, and read some others and read the court filing, and came to the realization that every bit of evidence whcih is suggestive of a sexual assault has come from either her court filing, or from her interviews with the media. There's a world of difference between having hotel security video, and the description of what one person (who has a vested interest in the outcome and potentially an ulterior motive) claims they were told by someone else about the security video.

Hmm, interesting. Reading some of the articles linked in that one, it seems that this guy has a habit of entering documents into the court record for no other purpose than to get them into the media.

Yep, as I observed here earlier:

There have been a small number of high profile cases in UK where police/CPS have failed to identify or disclose evidence that casts doubt on accusation. Failure is not limited to sexual crimes though. In part that's about not looking for evidence contrary to prosecution case. Far more though it's down to system's demand for everything in paper bundles and failure to deal with sheer volume of data on a phone or PC.

The accuser has had anonymity for around forty years. There's a reasonable case to be made for extending that to the accused. There would be discretion to judge to remove it in interest of justice such as where (Savile, Clifford etc) serial offending is probable.

Are you seriously suggesting the accuser should lose her anonymity if the case collapses? Do you include a not guilty verdict as a collapse? Not guilty means the jury were not sure; it doesn't make the accuser a lying charlatan. If she is then the charge of perverting the cause of justice is appropriate.

The pendulum has not even reached half way. While the consequences of an ill founded accusation against an innocent male are ruinous the probability for those not chancing their hand is around same as that of a dual engine failure from unrelated causes.

security video
 

If the hotel security video provides evidence that:

"... was incapacitated, that it took 18 to 20 minutes to get from the elevator to the room, and this whole time he’s trying to get me into the room, and I’m trying to put up whatever fight I can,” Pina said.

.... then this is nothing at all like a 'he said/she said" event.

Right. *if*.

I haven't seen that video, have you?

As nearly as I can tell, she (Pina) hasn't seen it either. So, like I said, what we have is what Pina claims that someone else told her the video shows. IOW, "she said". If there is indeed video whcih does indeed show the captain dragging her down the hall into his room and her clearly trying to resist (not drunkenly requiring assistance) then yeah, that's nothing like he said/she said.

Got a link to that video? If not, then all you, or I, or anyone else has is what she said.

A Squared, you'd need to have lived in the Seattle area to appreciate all the twists and complexities of the whole sad Ed Murray fiasco (very short version, gay Seattle Mayor was accused by multiple men of having been sexually abused by Murray as minors - some accusations first reported over 20 years ago - ultimately resulting in his resignation). There were enough people (many employed by the city of Seattle) attempting to protect Murray and smear his alleged victims that the lawyer in question probably believed it was the only way to get his version of the story out.
Once the accusations of sexual misconduct became public, others quickly came forward with similar stories, which pretty much sealed Murray's fate. Some have postulated a similar motive here - to get other possible victims to come forward.

I’d bet money that’s the motivation for all the publicity here—get a few F/As to come forth with a story like this F/O’s experience and AK, the captain is toast.
GF

I reckon the first thing the airline would do would be to ask to see the hotel's security video. I don't see how the hotel could refuse, especially as the lawsuit depends on it being called a work place.
If the video showed what is being alleged, the captain would have been immediately fired.

That's one of the things whcih don't quite add up. She claims that Alaska's attorney investigating the incident has seen the video, (prior to her filing of the lawsuit) and that it does show the captain dragging her into his room against her resistance, yet they didn't fire him. That seems extraordinary.

"..things which don't quite add up" more than quite I would say.

Not guilty means not guilty; not enought evidence presented to prove beyond reasonable doubt the accussed actually did what the accuser claims. Not guilty verdict does not, however, does not mean they were not sure, therefore the accused might still be guilty.

Not proven | Legal Issues in Scotland Wiki | FANDOM powered by Wikia
Not proven is a verdict available to a court in Scotland.
Under Scots law, a criminal trial may end in one of three verdicts: one of conviction ("proven") and two of acquittal ("not proven" and "not guilty"). Historically, the two verdicts available to Scots juries were that the case had been "proven" or "not proven". However in a dramatic case in 1728 the jury asserted "its ancient right" to bring in a "not guilty" verdict even when the facts of the case were proven (see jury nullification). As the "not guilty" verdict gained wide acceptance amongst Scots juries, Scots began to use "not guilty" in cases where the jury felt the "not proven" verdict did not adequately express the innocence of the defendant.

"get a few F/As to come forth with a story like this F/O’s experience and AK, the captain is toast"

Any FA short of cash? Join us and make free money. Captains are rich anyway!
To hell with the truth.

Unbelievable comment.... :rolleyes:

Or as Larry L. Archie, Esq. famously advertises: "Just because you did it doesn't mean you're guilty."


The plaintiff media campaign hails the accuser as a decorated military veteran. But so is the accused, a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel in the reserves.

Unless Alaska coughs up a big cash settlement, we'll probably find out more as this case progresses.

Sadly, that's the case in pretty much any legal process. It's an open secret in the industry that you can hire accredited 'experts' that will give whatever testimony you pay them to give.

Sailvi767
A colleague of mine with a well known ME airline had a similar accusation from an FA with the difference that she made a phone call to him saying unless you give me a large cash donation I'm going to accuse you of attempted rape and assault.
He immediately called ops, both removed from the flight. An investigation revealed her story false (hotel CCTV and key log) furthermore it also revealed she had used this ploy several times successfully in the past!

Conversly, I have been on jury service for a rape (inability to give consent) the perp was really cocky (sorry) arrogant and a genuine toerag but we couldn't find him guilty as not enough evidence to prove beyond reasonable doubt. Felt really frustrated but sometimes the law sucks. Sadly its all we have and this problem will always cause controversy with justice and injustice in both senses.

experts are not proffered victims. and its hardly a secret (anywhere) that experts are available to testify for a fee.

".....The suit appears long on accusations and short on evidence to me..."

So far, we have a Complaint and a couple of newspaper articles based on it. Do you really expect the "evidence" to be included in the Complaint?

Haven't you watched Perry Mason at least?

No, please enlighten us with your legal wisdom perfessor. ;)

The complaint isn’t evidence, it’s a complaint that’s all. The factual matter will come out of discovery, depositions and trial. This case won’t go to trial and likely be covered by NDAs all around. You’ll get more here than from the legal system.


Gf

google :

"........What Complaints Look Like

Criminal complaints tend to look similar, particularly within the same
county or court. Prosecuting offices have templates that they adjust
depending on the case at hand.

A complaint normally has a caption at the top indicating:
the court where the case is being filed
the party filing the complaint (for example, “The People of the State of
California” or “United States of America”), and
the defendant.

The complaint then includes come kind of description of the accusations against the defendant.

....."

and

"....evidence: Law. data presented to a court or jury in proof of the facts in issue and which may include the testimony of witnesses, records, documents, or objects....."