> The person that initially frames the issue will be given more credence in most cases, because we as a culture have pretty much taken a shit upon the whole notion of "innocent until proven guilty".
That's a legal precept, not a cultural one.
We've culturally never adhered to it as a nation, nor really pretended to.
We've really not done that great a job of it even in the legal realm, at the level of policing. The courts are a better story.