Memory On Trial

Memory On Trial

It is that angle as well that forces me to play devil's advocate when talking amongst friends about the case - One shocking headline does not make a man guilty.

By Citizen Correspondent Trisha Baptie

Date Posted: 07/04/07

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This week, Lynn Ellingsen's testimony continued. She is the only witness to allege she saw accused serial killer Robert Pickton with a dead body. Because she was and still is struggling with addiction, the defence has been attacking the accuracy of her memories. The more I spoke about Lynn Ellingsen this long weekend, the more I was reminded about two very important things: Memory loss under/ because of drug addiction and people's perception of things.

I will start off with a short story that came up this weekend that I had long forgot about, which also falls under the loss of memory/ drug abuse issue.

My nephew was over one night years ago along with a few others. We were just drinking hanging out on an average weekend night. My nephew lived in a another part of town, and I had a friend over who lived in the same general vicinity, so he was happy to drop her off at home.

The time came for him to leave, and since she had partied a little harder than the rest of us, she passed out some time earlier. Getting her up was proving to be a challenge. My nephew was shaking and yelling at her, I was trying to do the same, grabbing her arms and bringing her into the sitting position, all to no avail.

This went on for a bit. My nephew now really needed to go, so he bent over her, putting one of his knees between her legs on the sofa and grabbed both her shoulders to either shake her awake or lift her to the car. In that moment she woke up, and she woke up fighting. In that instant, her perception was that my nephew was trying to rape her because she couldn't understand why he was on top of her.

We all knew what had been going on, we were watching the whole thing and tried to calm her down to no avail. To this day, she believes my nephew was trying to rape her and she has never spoken to me since that night. She believes I am still covering for him.

Now, my own memory is horrible.