[crazygringo]

Yes, this is an atrocious article.

It makes no sense as presented.

The first thing the records should have shown was the full messaging history which would not have contained any of the incriminating messages.

But even if the messages no longer existed, there was no actual evidence. Truly, what on earth did the defense argue? How on earth was the jury convinced he was guilty?

Everything important about this story is missing from the article.

Edit: from another article, it seems like the conviction was made by a trial judge, and didn't even involve a jury: https://www.saltwire.com/nova-scotia/halifax/appeal-court-qu...

A single judge just decided that "his guilt was the only reasonable conclusion available". Scary. I like a lot of things about Canada, but I'm somewhat horrified at the idea that you can be sent to prison without a jury trial.

[nl]

> The first thing the records should have shown was the full messaging history which would not have contained any of the incriminating messages.

I think the point is that the message history would show incriminating messages.

He'd have been saying "this isn't me", but somehow no one noticed it was the wrong username.

[account42]

I think part of the confusion is also that the defense didn't disclaim the account was his but claimed that the account was hacked, which implies agreement that the account is his.

Still pretty flimsy evidence when they had voice recordings and pictures sent by the real culprit that surely didn't match the accused.

[crazygringo]

No, the message history wouldn't.

Because the message history was for his actual account, not the criminal's account.

The whole point is that they looked up the wrong username. And when they looked it up, they found an innocent man's identity, but didn't bother to look at the message history, which would not have had any of the messages.

Which is super-weird, because if he'd been messaging this one child, you'd think they'd be looking at all of his messages to find potential messages with other children. And then immediately noticing the lack of the messages that started the investigation in the first place.

[thephyber]

You are right, but your parent is right too.

If the police logged into his Kik account from his device, they would have seen the lack of connection to the case. If they simply trusted the Kik account contents from the subpoena response, then it was up to the defendant/experts to identify the issue and rebut the evidence.

[dzhiurgis]

IDK if you know much about kik but the only way this makes any sense is - I suspect he might have had other incriminating messages on his actual account he chose not to reveal.

[thephyber]

That is a hazard of the way evidence is collected for cases. If the state has a warrant and they find evidence of another crime while executing the warrant, that might be used to bring more charges. I don't know enough about law to know under what conditions it may be used or must be ignored.

But also, I read the article where it said that no corroborating evidence of any crime was found when searching his house or devices, so I suspect his Kik account is not likely to be full of illegal content if his other possessions weren't.

[jibal]

The message history of what? Not his account name, the one they had throughout the investigation and trial.

[AnodicElegy]

For all but minor offences in Canada, you have the right to a jury trial. Here, the accused elected to be tried by a judge. Most people do.

[gruez]

>Most people do.

Why?

[subarctic]

Maybe he or his lawyers thought he would fare better with a judge? Hard to say. I've heard that there are a lot fewer jury trial in Canada vs US but I'm not sure why.