About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline
LOG IN
LOG IN

26 Queen's L.J. 297 (2000-2001)
The Doctrine of Corroboration in Sexual Assault Trials in Early Twentieth-Century Canada and Australia

handle is hein.journals/queen26 and id is 307 raw text is: The Doctrine of Corroboration in Sexual Assault Trials in Early Twentieth- Century Canada and Australia Constance Backhouse* The author compares two early twentieth century criminal cases, one Australian and one Canadian, involving carnal knowledge of a child. The cases illustrate the parallel development of the doctrine of corroboration in sexual assault cases in the two countries - a doctrine which was based on the belief that the testimony of women and girls in such cases was inherently suspect. By requiring that corroborating evidence be independent of the complainant's testimony, and by interpreting that requirement in an extremely rigid way to exclude particular items of evidence that strongly supported the complaints, the courts in both cases imposed unjustified obstacles to the conviction of men accused of sexual offences. This misuse of the doctrine of corroboration contradicted the ideals of evenhanded justice and gender equality in both Canada and A ustralia. Introduction I. Ila Collins and Sophie Oleksiuk: Two Highly Credible Witnesses II. The Back-Up Evidence III. Whittling Down the Scope of Legal Corroboration: The Australian Example IV. Strangling the Doctrine of Corroboration: The Canadian Example Conclusion Introduction Canadian and Australian scholars have increasingly begun to search each other's historical legal records for evidence of similarity and difference. The two countries have much in common. They were birthed as colonies by the same mother country and share roots in the British commonwealth tradition. C. Backhouse

What Is HeinOnline?

HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.



Short-term subscription options include 24 hours, 48 hours, or 1 week to HeinOnline.

Purchase Access

Contact us for annual subscription options:

Contact Us

Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?

Log In

profiles profiles most