Yuku free message boards

The thing obviously would be political once she goes public. The Commodore has badly mishandled the whole exercise. The only mitigation that he can use is damning of the whole organisation.

He can say that he is dealing with it the way it has been dealt with in the past. That is career endingly bad for him and anyone he implicates and it could get worse. Multiple civil damage cases even if he is not personally liable he will be in court as will many others.

He can try that he is trying to preserve the career possibilities of the young lady but that only paints the organisation as a an unforgiving male dominated organisation needing cultural change and what is he doing about that mandated cultural change with the recruits? He is done again. At the least his career at ADFA is over and he needs to have a black mark against him for failing in an appointment. The whole executive of the ADFA would also be likely to get the boot.

He can say, honestly, that he has referred it to the police and they have found no criminal conduct. However, the cadets should already be on charges at ADFA regardless of the police finding even if the progress of the charges is suspended while the police investigate. They were not and his career is over. Who else goes is the big question.

If any of the rumours that the other cadets were not going to be dealt with severely or that she had been asked to apologise are proved, then he will be lucky to stay in the service. He simply had no grasp of how to deal with this issue even after HMAS Success.

The female cadet is possibly unfit to be an officer but she is off limits now. No charges against her because the findings, unless advantageous to her, can be seen as being part of a victimisation that is obviously provable. When the women is subject to harrassment by the fellow students, the question will be asked what have the military done to protect her? The whole executive of ADFA are gone. She cannot be made to stay in the military but the military are labouring under a serious misapprehension if they think getting rid of her will solve all their problems.

All sorts of people are coming forward with their own unhappy stories. The best outcome for the military is for this very iffy officer candidate to stay in the forces and be able to demonstrate cultural change has happened. She is safe.

The young men who were party to this seem like private boys school products. They are ultra intelligent but have no idea that they can get in trouble for their very public sexual misuse of this woman. They have no right to be that dumb. In a co-educational, school environment, they would have been taught that if this girl was seventeen and eleven months, they could go to gaol for trafficking in child pornography.

Smith has every right to be angry. He may have overreacted because he stated the facts publically but they are the facts. he has done the correct thing and removed the head of ADFA and instituted all sorts of inquiries. I presume the staff at ADFA have been educated that the girl is to be protected but that is a big presumption.

So far as it not being a criminal offence goes, the lawyers will tell you that the law varies a little from state to state. In NSW it can be sexual assault if the female withdraws her consent at any stage. She has not consented to be photographed. The boy was pushing his luck.

It is true that we are hearing only filtered editions of what was said and done and maybe even the sequencing of what was done. I pointed out, once the woman goes public it is a political issue and different rules are going to apply. I would be happy to argue that Commodore Kafer has acted consistently with the best interests of the ADF foremost and probably in the best interests of the woman too. None of that will count except possibly Defence will be able to save him from dismissal.

He is going to have to prove that he has acted in the best interests of justice and the female at all stages and I doubt that he will be able to do that. Because he is the Commodore, he is going to be responsible for the cuture of an organisation that allows a group of cadets to do what they did without anyone dobbing on them. He is responsible for the culture and he is on very shaky ground there. Most importantly, he is going to have to show that he has acted to protect the female cadet once [and this is not alleged] the wrong against her becomes known.

What he has done is to allow the charges concerning her being out drinking when she should not have been, to go ahead. He has probably thought that he is showing the rest of cadets that she is subject to justice too which will assist her relationships with the other cadets. he or someone else has suggested to the girl that if she is strong enough, get the hearing out of the road. That is one problem gone and move on. She has been punished and she is the victim?

http://www.abc.net.au/new...s/2011/04/07/3184618.htm

Here it says that she was charged at the same meeting at which she found out about the recording of her sex act.

What he has done is to suggest that she apologise to the cadets for going public and bringing the name of the institution into disrepute. This will assist her in the relationships wityh other cadets whilst teaching all the cadets that they must not behave in a way that brings the college into disrepute. [Now I understand that that Commodore has denied this but can he prove it?] Again the victim is being punished and I know from personal experience that sometimes this is a good way to help the bullied. However, the Commodore is never going be able to prove that he has taken steps against the bullies while supporting the victim.

http://www.onlineopinion....u/view.asp?article=11881

I think that the College was probably right to ask for a police opinion on whether a crime had been committed. Whether the Minister or the Commodore or both asked the police to look again at their advice that no crime had been committed does not matter if the College has not taken other steps, timely steps, to exact justice on the male cadets who took part in the initial show and who circulated the photos without reporting it. Here I would like to say that it seems to me that someone must have reported it.

I do not know that the Commodore can hang around saying that he is waiting for the police investigation to conclude before taking action. It is wholely unsatisfactory to have the perpetrators of the offence [I presume they have committed a number of offences under military and college law not all of them do they have to be charged with] walking around the same corridors as the victim with her being punished and them not. There are a number of steps he might take and he should have invented some. Possibly he should not have involved the police.

If the Commodore has done everything "by the book", then it is likely that he will told that it was the wrong book.

Where Smith has been wrong is that he has critisised an officer who is not able to reply. [Note that he did not actually name the officer when he made his original criticsm.] He may also be shown to be wrong in that he may have spoken as a result of reports that were incomplete or inaccurate. If it costs Smith his job, that will be very unfortunate because he is one of the most able ministers in the government and one of the more capable defence ministers that Defence has had. Unfortunately it is political and Smith has to react, fast. The Oppostion has criticised him for saying too much and for not doing enough.

Smith's response has been pretty good. The Commodore's response has not worked whether he can retreat to "the book" or not. Plainly the victim felt she had been wronged not just by the male cadets but by the College. That is Kafer who could have done sopmething about that as well as other executive of the college. Obviously they needed to. I would be able to argue that Kafer is a good officer on the little I know but he has not been good enough in this instance.

Larrikin, what you say is possible. Her story was that the males were going to be lined up for a slap on the wrist and she did what she did to make sure that something more was done.

The evidence seems to be on her side. How she can expect to continue her career in the military is a mystery to me. However, Kafer and the college had not taken any action against the males involved. No authority ever contradicted her assertion.

Some cadet reported it but no one has said that one of the half dozen audience reported it. There have been reports of still photos being circulated. I presume that some cadet saw or heard something about this and reported it but I do not know. If none of the men involved in the original activity reported it then they have no reason to tread lightly.

It is not certain from what I have read when the female cadet realised she had been videoed. If the first she heard of it was when she was being charged for another offense then the people [God forbid that they were all males,] who did that need new jobs. They see her leave to throw up. What do they do to assist her?

At no stage does the female cadet talk about the charges that the other cadets will face. Neither the Minister for Defence nor the Chief of Defence, nor anyone else talk about more than that there is a police investigation going one. The female is being punished and has been punished. The other cadets are not, yet. Just not good enough.

Wabpilot is spot on. It is not only unjust to punish the victim [and no, I am sorry, she has been punished] while the main offenders have not even been charged, it is stupid. Modern young females have a different idea of their rights and entitlements. He should have seen the danger that the young woman, either to protect herself or out of a sense of injustice would go public. As CliffS pointed out to me, he has serious rank and is supposed to do that sort of anticpation.

I might have said that she is probably unfit to be an officer in the ADF. The Minister said that the College has given her a lot of evidence that she has been victimised. I can't imagine how anyone can believe that the College and Kafer in particular, has not given her that evidence. If it is as you, Larrikin22 believe, then the Commodore has been beaten by a Cadet, how thoroughly remains to be seen.

What a few people are turning a blind eye to is the damage that this is doing to the ADF. I would not like my daughters to go into the organisation. Senator Nick Minchin has come out swinging for Commodore Kafer. He has nearly turned the debate back onto Smith. Most politicians know that they cannot support Kafer publicly or in the party room. It is big and bad enough case to harm funding for the ADF. It has brought a great pile of similar complaints out of the woodwork dating back decades. Some men are claiming to have been sodomised!

The Defence Minister has done a great job of organising about six different inquiries by people respected by both sides of politics with good terms of references. He has got the complaints off the front pages and out of the letters column. Some complaints will pass away and some will be buried in long reports. Others will surface but not for a long time. Smith has little to nothing to say sorry for. Kafer on the other hand is a professional Navy officer with the rank equivalent to a task group commander. I do not think he can be saved.

Kafer was the officer in charge. He has been well thought of before this. Unfortunately his ship has been sunk as a result of his actions. His career is most likely over.