One of the biggest news stories this weekend has been the arrest in the UK of former All Black and Chief Mils Muliaina on suspicion of sexual assault.
Unlike in New Zealand, where such a high-profile sportsman may well have been granted name suppression - at least temporarily - his name and the allegation were splashed all over TV, newspapers and social media along with footage of him being led to a police van, soon after finishing a game.
Cue the predictable pub talk and social media reaction, with many "taking sides" with either Muliaina or the complainant despite having zero knowledge of the facts. Rightly or wrongly, his All Black status makes this allegation more interesting to the public than one against an average Joe Bloggs. And many people seemed to want to weigh in on it.
Immediately jumping to his defence and inferring the alleged victim is lying, perhaps because of Muliaina's celebrity status (I saw the term "gold digger" used on Twitter this weekend, sparking heated debate) is disgusting, while it's also wrong to immediately assume his guilt before he's had a chance to defend himself. I don't know Muliaina or the alleged victim and I have no idea what did or didn't happened that night in Cardiff. Which is why I have no right to speculate and why I felt no need to do so.
At the time of writing this, Muliaina had been released on bail pending further investigation. No charges had been laid. Human nature is what it is, but perhaps in this case we should think about letting the justice system do its thing and the facts come out before we rush to publicly judge or condemn anyone involved. Come to think of it, not a bad idea for all such allegations, All Black or not.
