Article content

Jian Ghomeshi, leaving the Old City Hall courthouse in Toronto Thursday, didn’t have the air of a victorious man, in spite of his acquittal on charges of sexual assault and choking. Face bloated, eyes sunken: He looked like someone who knows that even if he has been cleared in a court of law, his public reputation won’t easily recover.

Almost everyone lost something in this case. Ghomeshi, the three women who testified against him, the CBC where the high-profile radio personality once worked. The news media, too, for hanging on every lurid detail. If there was any “winner,” it was justice – in the form of a judge who rigorously ignored public opinion and reached the only verdict the evidence could elicit. But even the justice system has much to learn from how this case proceeded.

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

tap here to see other videos from our team. Try refreshing your browser, or Editorial: Ghomeshi, the symbolic trial Back to video

“There is no tangible evidence. There is no DNA. There is no ‘smoking gun,’ ” wrote Ontario Court Judge William Horkins. Indeed, he found that the evidence given by the women – two whose identities are protected by a publication ban, the third, an actor, Lucy DeCoutere – “suffered not just from inconsistencies and questionable behaviour, but was tainted by outright deception.”