The conflict here concerns the jurors who argued over whether the woman actually wore the eyeglasses. The conflict started when Juror 9 pointed noticed the indentation on Juror 4’s nose, which reminded him of the woman who testified that she saw the boy murder his father from across the el track. If she was an eyeglass wearer, the probability of her not wearing it during the time of the murder would be high as she would have had no time to put them on as she jumped out of bed because the light went off right at the time of murder. At that point,most jurors started to agree that there was a room for reasonable doubt with regards the woman’s testimony as she had those marking on her nose and the fact that she was not wearing glass in court because
Now look at Rosina Townsend who maintained the brothel. Mrs. Townsend’s brothel was a high-end brothel, but her reputation or her word was worth mo more than a piece of dirt in the bottom of your shoe. This was demonstrated the most during the trial. Judge Ogden Edwards spent an entire hour instructing the jury. The judge instructed the jury to weigh all characters involved, victim, accused, and witnesses. He instructed that the prostitutes were not to be believed unless corroborated by respectable individuals. He went as far as to try to establish an alibi for Robinson in respect to visiting the brothel on the night of the murder. If the jury felt Robinson’s guilt was beyond doubt, then to convict him; if not acquit.
The personality of juror # 10 was one of hatefulness and anger. This juror was prejudice against the kid because he was from the slums. Juror # 10 said something in the movie about not being able to trust people who are from the slums. Juror # 10 had several outbursts and had a heinous attitude through most of the movie. Juror # 10 was the one who did most of the talking, when it came to trying to convince Juror # 8 that the kid was guilty. There was another Juror that had a roundabout same type of personality coming into the juror’s room as juror # 10. The juror # 3 was also bitter and obstinate towards the others, specifically when it came down to several of the other jurors changing their opinion of guilty to not guilty. Juror # 3 became hot headed and very loud and obnoxious towards everyone. Both Juror # 10 and juror # 3 were only looking at the eye witness testimony,
The judge, in the movie, actually listened to the prosecutor’s witnesses and decided there was enough probable cause to move forward to a trial. Many judges are often too busy to examine the facts of the case before making a probable cause determination as stated in our text.
Juror #8 is a calm and reasonable man which makes it easier for him to judge the case fairly and justly without any prejudice. Juror #8 never said he believed the defendant to be innocent he only wanted to take the role of being a juror seriously and talk about the case before a young boy is sent off to die. “I’m not trying to change your mind it’s just that we’re talking about somebody’s life here… we can’t decide in five minutes.” Because he brings no prejudice in the jury room he is able to look at the facts and carefully decide on his judgement. Juror #8 recognizes other peoples prejudice and tries not to convince them that the boy is innocent but to have them let go of that prejudice and decide based on the facts whether they truly believe the defendant is guilty or not. Rose uses both juror
You're not gonna tell me you believe that phony story about losing the knife, and that business about being at the movies. Look, you know how these people lie! It's born in them! I mean what the heck? I don't even have to tell you. They don't know what the truth is! And lemme tell you, they don't need any real big reason to kill someone, either! No sir! [Juror 10, page 51] This type of prejudice offended many of the other jurors, especially Juror 5 who is of similar race to the accused.
The last major fact that influences the juries agreement that the accused is not guilty are doubts of another witness’s testimony; the lady across the street who supposedly saw the accused young man stab his father. The jurors started talking about needing glasses to read the clock when Juror 8 realizes that the lady used very strong glasses and it is not possible that she could have had time to put them on and see the young man clearly stab his father. Juror 8 says,
It was interesting to see the large differences in each juror’s lives. Every jury is eclectic because it is made up of very different people with very different family lives. For example, Juror #3 seems to be a well educated and well off man as he was wearing suspenders and a dress shirt. However, Juror #7 was a young man who seemed fairly uneducated and fairly poor because he dressed in a sweatsuit and used improper language. It was very interesting to see these different personalities clash. In the beginning when the men are all on the same page that the defendant is guilty except one, the men generally more relaxed (except for Juror #3).However, as more of the men start to explain their reasonings for seeing reasonable doubt, tension is prevalent in the room. The men who vote guilty are rallying up against the people who voted not guilty. The feeling of the room switches again as most jurors decide the defendant is guilty. That being said, Juror #3 creates a lot of tension in the room throughout the film due to the the fact that he yells at anyone who disagrees with him because he is unwilling to hear their opinions. For example, while one man is explaining why he thinks there is reasonable doubt, juror #3 decides to start a game of tic tac toe. This is very interesting because he is ready to send the defendant to his deathbed
The impact of eyewitness testimony upon the members of a jury has been the subject of various research projects and has guided the policies formed by the federal government regarding its competent use in criminal matters (Wells, Malpass, Lindsay, Fisher, Turtle, & Fulero, 2000). Therefore, eyewitness studies are important to understand how
In 12 Angry Men, Juror #8 tries to convince the other jurors that the defendant of the case, an 18 year old boy accused of stabbing his father to death, is not guilty based on a reasonable doubt. Throughout the film Juror #8 goes over the facts and details of the case to point out the flaws in the evidence in order to prove there is, in fact, a reasonable doubt. The film depicts the struggles of the underdog and going against the majority in order to stand up for what is right. In one scene, the piece of evidence being put into question is a testimony from an elderly man who lived below the boy and his father and claimed he heard the murder happen and saw the boy leave the apartment after it happened. It is being put into question whether the elderly man who walked with a limp could make it to his doorway in order to witness the boy running away from the crime in fifteen seconds.
His prejudice caused conflict with all of the other jury members and after some time he too changed his vote to not guilty. The stock broker with the glasses was the eleventh juror to vote not guilty. He was the fourth juror and self assured that his decision was correct and that the defendant had murdered his father. He was involved in simple conflict with the rest of the jurors.
Juror 3 was basing his failed relationship with his son on the accused boy. The reason that he had such a bad relationship with his son is because when the boy was young, he ran away from a fight and Juror 3 said: “I’m going to make a man out of you or I’m going to bust you up into little pieces trying”. Later on, when his son was older, they got into a fight and Juror 3 hasn’t seen him since. This experience probably left him the impression that all kids take their loved ones for granted, and that they deserve severe punishments. Juror 3 is not the type to provide the sharpest evidence or information, but he is very determined to prove that the accused really did murder the victim. Juror 8 practically gives nothing away about his real life, probably because he did not want to add his own prejudices to the case. Juror 3 gave both his ill-mannered personality and bigotry away in the play.
One has impressions on her nose, and then she must wear glasses. If she wears glasses, her eyesight is probably poor. If her eyesight is probably poor, then her testimony is questionable. Hypothetical reasoning.
In the 1960’s and 1970’s, the Supreme Court began to recognize the issues of faulty eyewitness testimony and began to establish limited safeguards. Some of the safeguards introduced by the Supreme Court include allowing the defendant to have an attorney present at a lineup, allowing defendants to challenge identifications resulting from questionable police procedures, and establishing model jury instructions (Jost 862-863).
The old man gave evidence that he heard the boy say “I’ll kill you” from his apartment below and that he saw the boy running from the down the stairs from the apartment after rising from his bedroom. The old lady saw the boy kill his father through her window, whilst a train was passing. Juror #8 analyses each of these points and makes credible arguments that the conclusion is flawed based on incorrect reasoning, by pointing out inconsistencies in the conclusions reached. The other jurors are content to believe that their reasoning is solid, as they have used examples of deductive reasoning to reach their conclusion. Juror #3 gives his reasons for reaching the conclusion that “It’s quite clear that the boy never went to the movies that night, returned home and killed his father with the knife as identified in Court” (Fonda & Lumet, 1957). Until Juror #8 takes out a similar knife and poses the question that it was possible that another knife was used, Juror #7 calls it a million to one however Juror #8 persists in saying it was possible. He also uses this analysis method to cast aspersions on the second point and third points raised by systematically analyzing each component.
noticed that another juror wore glasses just like one of the witnesses because of the marks on his nose