A dire warning in this incident...
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Posted by Boyd from Canada on June 01, 2021 at 02:03:31:
In Reply to: Re: WO (ret'd) Stopford posted by Gunner on May 31, 2021 at 18:39:37:
Assuming for a moment that the victim is wrong and that he was poisoned by his subordinates(As the anecdotal evidence seems to bear out.). A previous post mentioned that the statuate of limitations had run out on this incident. Untrue. There is NO statuate of limitations on attempted murder. The charges will probably never be laid, due to the unique circumstances that the soldiers were in. I'll explain why: The first question would be determining intent. Were they trying to kill the victim or simply render him unable to function, thus causing him to be returned to Canada. Since the accused in this case would be able to prove far beyond a reasonable doubt that if their intent was to kill him, he'd be dead(A group of heavily armed and trained infantry soldiers? If they are unable to kill in this circumstance, there are bigger problems than appears.). This would form a key basis of any defence. If the soldiers could prove that the WO was taking actions, or that they had reasonable apprehension that he was about to, take actions that would place them in danger of death or serious bodily harm, by rendering him incapaciated they saved their own lives, they have a defence of self-defence. The military would have to put themselves on trial and run the risk that some enterprising soldier takes the issue to the Supreme Court of Canada. This would rip open a can of worms that the CAF probably wants shut. Despite all of the posturing aside, the CAF's military justice system is still subordinate to the SCC. I don't think that the CAF wants to have the SCC(And the public) hearing of soldiers being pushed into actions like this. While the court might rule against the soldiers, the PR damage done to the CAF would be horrific.The greater issue, however, is that if this actually happened, our government needs to take a LONG hard look at Canada's Armed Forces. If the organization that is generally the most heavily disciplined in terms of control of it's actions is engaging in acts like this(As opposed to Somalia, where the bulk of the crimes were acts of ommission as opposed to commission.)this will not be the last such incident...
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