Once any steps are taken to justify the decision that the accused is guilty, it becomes very difficult for the official to accept disconfirming evidence, and this can continue during appeals, retrials, or any other effort to revisit a verdict.
Findings of multiple studies performed between 1987 and 1995 suggested that the rate of false allegations ranged from a low of 6% to a high of 35% of reported child sexual abuse cases.
[8] Experts have argued that the reason for the wide range of differences in the rates resulted from varying criteria used in various studies.
[30] In 2000, according to support group Falsely Accused Carers and Teachers (FACT), there was a 90% conviction rate for alleged child sex abusers, as compared to just 9% for cases of adult rape.
[31] In the UK, all the post-1970 court cases that are recognized as authorities on evidence of disposition “concern charges of sexual abuse of minors.”[32] In 1991, the House of Lords judgment in Director of Public Prosecutions versus P (D.P.P v P [1991] 2 A.C. 447) significantly lowered the barrier to admission of similar fact evidence of disposition to commit a crime.
In effect, the courts have accepted the idea of “corroboration by volume.” In 2002, the Home Affairs Select Committee (Fourth report, 2001/2), which dealt with police trawling practices and referred to the “enormous difficulties” faced by those accused of child sexual abuse, recommended that the requirement for similar fact evidence to be linked by “striking similarities” be restored in cases involving allegations of historical child abuse.
However, this recommendation contradicted the Government White Paper Justice for All (2002), which proposed lowering the threshold for the admission of similar fact evidence still further.
The accused, even if acquitted, risks being fired from their job, losing their friends and other relationships, having their property vandalized or even confiscated (via civil forfeiture), and being harassed by those believing them to be guilty despite no evidence proving their guilt.