by squiggle » Fri Jan 09, 2015 9:25 am
Some people are too sure he's innocent. There are miscarriages of justice but plenty of people protest their innocence when they're guilty as hell.
In general I'm very much in favour of rehabilitation, but there are exceptions. I wouldn't want a police officer convicted of brutality to continue being a police officer (except perhaps behind a desk). Would I want a convicted rapist having his name sung by children? I'd be pretty uncomfortable with it.
But if he's innocent? (I'm reminded of the Alan Partridge sketch:
'ALAN: Well, with the greatest respect, the police are hardly likely to arrest him if he's innocent, are they?
NICK: With slightly less respect, haven't you heard of wrongful arrest?
ALAN: No.
NICK: Guildford four, Birmingham six -
ALAN: Well, yes, but that's different. Now, they are innocent.' )
If he's innocent he certainly hasn't helped himself by not distancing himself from suporters who have, apparently, been harassing the woman in question. And from a brief look at his site, some parts of it seem a little unconvincing. The bit about the 'win big' tweets, for example, which says 'All of the above is entirely accurate and whilst it does not in any way confirm the meaning of the ‘win big tweets’, one could perhaps draw their own conclusions. Well, what conclusions? How was she going to get money from a conviction? We're meant to infer something negative but we're not really given much reason to do so.
‘Sometimes I watch Match of the Day to see how we’ve been perceived. It’s better to watch it with the sound turned down.’