I had a big network of colleagues, many of whom I considered friends and quite a few of whom I had worked with for many years. Almost all of that disappeared the day I was arrested, and the arrest was publicized by police.
As an aside, we take for granted that arrests will be made public, including the name of the person arrested, but one must wonder why. In some countries, the name of an accused person cannot be reported until they are found guilty. Most of us see an arrest as equivalent to a guilty finding — even though about 40 per cent of arrests in Canada do not lead to a conviction.
Police sometimes say they publicize arrests to encourage other victims to come forward, but that could be done without necessarily identifying the person arrested. In my case, despite a very large amount of publicity, nobody else ever did “come forward.”
Within days of my arrest being public, I received several notices terminating me from various projects. I was suspended from my work. I went from getting dozens of career-related calls and emails a day to getting none. My one social media page was so inundated with accusing or hateful messages that it had to be shut down.
At a time when I was reeling from this huge shock to my life, a lot of my support system was removed and replaced with anger and vitriol. My life, previously so busy, was suddenly empty. Days full of obligations and events were replaced by days full of nothing and no ability to plan for the future.
There were some very important exceptions. The day after my arrest there was a card in my mailbox from some friends expressing support. A few others called or got in touch in a positive way. It’s hard to describe how much that meant to me at that moment. Every single person who was willing to say hello mattered hugely to me, even as I understood why many people would not want to do so.
Most important, my family remained very supportive. That support was just so essential; I’m not sure how I would have survived without it.
Here, too, a challenge arose. My lawyer told me I should not talk to my family at all about what I had done (or not done) and why, lest they be subpoenaed to testify against me. But I could not do that; it was quite impossible that I would not try to explain what had happened to the people I loved most and who were standing beside me. (This was not the last time there was a conflict between legal advice intended to protect me and what I felt I needed to do to maintain my life.)
During my many months on bail, a pattern emerged. I was pleasantly surprised when someone I had not known all that well got in contact in a positive way. I was disappointed when others, whom I thought I knew well, were unwilling to speak with me at all. I was entirely unable to predict who would fall in which camp. Eventually, I concluded that people’s stance towards me had little to do with me and was primarily about how the charges against me affected them, and that often had to do with events in their own lives of which I was unaware.
People’s responses were also affected by how they thought others would react. Several times I got messages indirectly from people saying that they would like to be in touch, but they were afraid of the repercussions for themselves or their work organizations if they were seen to have any contact with me. On the one hand, this was heartening and on the other hand, it was a sad commentary on a world in which people feared, realistically, being “cancelled” if they were seen to be in contact with me.
Losing my career and those connections was also very hard. Before my arrest, I had constant requests to do things and often had to refuse due to lack of time. All that stopped instantly. Projects in which I was involved were cancelled — even though I was still officially innocent and had, presumably, the same skills and knowledge as I had had just prior. In many cases, my work was removed from public sight, and in more than one case, my work stayed in the public domain, but my name was taken off — without my ever being asked or informed. The criminal charge seemed enough to justify people doing some very dubious things, presumably in the name of morality!
I understand that many people felt deeply hurt by what looked like a betrayal of their trust in me. Yet others made surprising assumptions. People who I knew to be skeptical about the media nonetheless seemed to assume that everything reported about me was true — which was definitely not the case. One person told me that I must have done something very wrong because I had hired an expensive lawyer to defend me.
All of this happened before my case came to court, and before I had been convicted of anything. I was led to conclude that for most people, the presumption in criminal cases is of guilt, not of innocence. I could not really blame anyone for their reaction; in their place, I might well have done the same. It’s very hard to swim against the tide of anger that crime creates. Yet others have told me that they had similar experiences at times of crisis that were not about crime — such as illness or loss; that then, too, you are abandoned by many people who for one reason or another cannot cope with your situation.
What I gained was a greatly increased appreciation for what it means to have people stand with me in the worst times of my life. This does not mean they excused anything I did — it just means they still cared about me as a person. Despite centuries of being told we should make a distinction between the sinner and the sin, it is apparent that many people are unable to do so. My gratitude to those who could and did is huge.
David Dorson is the pen name of someone who went through arrest, case disposition, imprisonment and parole in Ontario a few years ago. Law360 Canada has granted him anonymity because he offers a unique perspective on a subject that matters deeply to many readers, and revealing the author’s identity would make re-establishment in the community after serving his sentence much more difficult than it already is.
The opinions expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the author’s firm, its clients, Law360 Canada, LexisNexis Canada or any of its or their respective affiliates. This article is for general information purposes and is not intended to be and should not be taken as legal advice.
Interested in writing for us? To learn more about how you can add your voice to Law360 Canada, contact Analysis Editor Peter Carter at peter.carter@lexisnexis.ca or call 647-776-6740.