Just showing that society cannot cope with the huge quantity of false allegations - read the final lines!

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/sussex/7047442.stm

During one year I witnessed six men from just one wing of Risley prison have their convictions of serious sexual assault/rape quashed by the Court of Appeal. I helped some prepare their paperwork, and with a couple it was obvious that their lack of education had contributed to their downfall.

I don't know how many from other wings and other prisons had their convictions overturned. But I know that very few make the headlines.

Actually the Mail gave it quite good coverage and I quote...

David Carrington-Jones was convicted on the evidence of a woman who had a history of making false allegations, the court heard.

Quashing the 64-year-old lorry driver's conviction, Sir Igor Judge warned that women who cry rape undermine those who make genuine complaints.

He said: "Rape is a repulsive crime. It requires substantial punishment.

"On the other hand, just because rape is a repulsive crime, a false allegation can have very dreadful consequences, obviously and immediately, for the innocent man who has not perpetrated the crime.

"But also - and this is not to be overlooked - because every occasion of a proved false allegation has an insidious effect on confidence in the truth of genuine complaints of rape."

Might I point you to one word in the judge's statement... "PROVED".

How much greater is the effect on public confidence of the thousands of false allegations that are NOT proved fake, where innocent men and women languish in prison unable to prove they didn't do something as there is no proof they DID.

Until the law is changed to stop one person's word being enough to convict, that insidious sickness will continue to grow into an epidemic.

A barrister once said to me that it's easier to defend a guilty person because then you have knowledge of the crime and know what you are dealing with. It's a nightmare to try to defend an innocent man, especially when there's no actual evidence of a crime. There's nothing to get your teeth into.