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“It’s clear that not many people believe the prosecution did a good job,”Maggi said. For example, only eight per cent of women said they strongly approved of the Crown’s conduct versus 20 per cent of men. More than a third of women strongly disapproved, compared to just 23 per cent of men.

“There are really clear gender lines here in terms of how people reacted to how this was prosecuted,” Maggi said.

Those numbers suggest a split at the extremes, among people who were deeply interested in the case, taking part in what Maggi described as “trial by social media.” Indeed, in the middle ground of people who were “somewhat” approving or disapproving, the gender split was only 0ne percentage point.

But among those who said they followed the case closely, women were far more likely to strongly disapprove, and men more likely to strongly approve. For example, 39 per cent of women said they strongly disapproved of the verdict compared to 30 per cent of men.

Curiously, strong approval of the verdict showed much less of a gender split, with 13 per cent of men and 11 per cent of women solidly in favour of the outcome.

I think this is more about sense versus feel

“I think this is more about sense versus feel,” Maggi said. “In polling, I always say there are head, heart, and gut voters. It’s the same thing with any issue.” While Maggi believes those who followed the trial closely would have been aware of the obstacles to a conviction, a lot of people still clearly felt the acquittal somehow missed the point of justice. The gut, he said, was in conflict with the head.

Incredibly, the poll even found some people who said they were unaware of the whole thing — five per cent of people aged 18 to 34, and 13 per cent of seniors. This was in contrast to the more than two-thirds of Torontonians who said they followed the case closely.

Older people also seemed more approving of the outcome.

The poll of 2017 Torontonians was conducted by phone — both land lines and cellphones — on March 24, the day of the verdict. It has a margin of error of 2.18 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

jbrean@nationalpost.com

Twitter.com/JosephBrean