Should someone accused of sexual assault be allowed to fight his charges before he is charged?

CBC's Murray Brewster seems to think so

CBC’s veteran military reporter Murray Brewster recently published the story of a soldier who commited suicide weeks after he had been charged with sexual assault.

The story, told through the soldier’s family, is a classic example of how exactly not to cover sexual assault. Brewster’s opinions on how these cases are treated shines through, from how he framed the story, to the little pieces of information he decided to throw into it.

You can read it here: https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/military-sexual-misconduct-suicide-1.6596686

First, Brewster establishes doubt about the charges that were laid against the accused in the first sentence: Cristian Hiestand was afraid “no one would listen to him.” Weeks later, he killed himself, goes the sentence.

Then, we understand why — he had been charged with sexual assault. Not saying that this was related to the charges, Brewster writes that the charges came, “days after he'd ended a tumultuous, short-term relationship with a civilian woman.” He then gives us even more precision: the charges were “less than a week after he broke off the relationship and within five days of authorities receiving a complaint from the civilian woman in question.”

Tumultuous. Short-term. Confirmed-ish: “the civilian woman in question” is likely the source of the complaint. Brewster is cagey in writing directly that this woman is the victim. Maybe this short-term woman was angry and went to police because she was mad that the tumulutous relationship was over? Or did she go to them after he assaulted her? Or did he assault her and then break up with her and then she went to the police?

It’s left to the reader to decide.

But these aren’t the details that matter. The crux of the piece is this: Hiestand didn’t get to tell his side of the story before he was charged. The military police said they had everything they needed to lay the charges without talking to Hiestand. His sister told Brewster that Hiestand had text messages that “he believed would provide more context and backup his claim of innocence.”

But because he didn’t have the chance to talk to the military police before he was charged, now he is dead, argued Hiestand’s sister.

This is a very sad story. There’s no question about that. And it raises some very important questions about the responsibility that police and the courts have to keep people alive before they go to trial. These bodies *do* have a responsibility to keep suspects alive (check out this episode of Sandy and Nora for a deeper discussion about this). If charges plunge a suspect into a state of depression, there needs to be resources and support made available to help that person while they await trial.

But Brewster doesn’t ask any of these questions. Instead, he insinuates that the military police need to allow for suspects to argue against their charges before they actually go to trial — something that is not normal in a non-military police setting.

Which then begs the question: why would it be normal in a military police setting? Because misunderstandings can simply be cleared up? Because assault to one person is actually not assault to another, and a conversation before laying charges is enough to deal with the matter?

The CAF has deep sexual assault problems, and these problems are well-known. Part of those problems, I suspect, is a culture that imagines that a suspect’s opinion on what happened before a trial starts, always matters. Maybe it might matter in some cases but, in this case, the evidence was, according to military police, solid enough for Hiestand to have to wait until trial before he could defend himself — like most people who are charged with a crime must do. So why does Brewster write about this situation as if this extremely normal procedure is not only not normal, but it’s actually bad, and it’s the reason for why Hiestand took his own life?

Brewster only interviews Hiestad’s family' lawyer, his sister and parents to discuss the details of the case. His sister blames the decision of military police to charge Hiestand because, “‘They're being swayed by public opinion, which currently is on the side of 'believe all women.’” Brewster helpfully adds that she even attended Me Too rallies in California, where she lives, as if there’s any realm on the planet where this detail matters. But Brewster is saying this: if a Me Too supporter thinks that the pendulum has swung too far to one side, well, maybe it has.

Deep in the article, Brewster interviews law professor Craig Scott who says that what happened in this case: “‘It's not unusual,’ said Scott, who added that in this instance, military police ‘would charge based on the evidence produced through the complaint from a victim. And they don't have an obligation — as the law as currently is understood at the stage of investigation and charge — to go talk to the accused.’”

Of course, Brewster follows this with a quote from Hiestand’s family’s lawyer, who disagreed with Scott, though Scott, who does not have a horse in this race, is merely stating fact.

The piece ends with this from Hiestand’s father, "They just simply throw him under the bus, as far as I'm concerned. That's terrible for a country, in my opinion. For somebody that is willing to give his life for the country, they should have at least investigated him."

Yes, he should have been investigated and he would have been investigated — just not before he was charged for a million compelling reasons. And yes, they should have helped to keep him alive. And yes, they should have been able to move quickly to trial, which is another problem within the justice system. But those are not issues Brewster thought to mention.

Brewster is CBC’s principal military reporter and his opinion shines through every sentence in this piece. If this is the guy who is supposed to fairly report on sexual assault within the military and this is how he manages, I’m not sure how we’re supposed to trust what he writes.