Juror's Monologue

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.

In addition, Juror 8 was also fair. He said "It's not easy for me to raise my hand and send a boy

Juror 8 had many chances to change his opinion about the boy’s case, and yet he never did. Throughout this whole play, Juror 8 stood his ground and was

From there the viewers see that the 12 Jurors retire to a private room where they briefly become acquainted before the deliberation begins. It is clear to the viewers that even before deliberation begins that there are clear biases among the Jurors. The Jurors number off and give their verdicts, and almost right off the bat all the Jurors, aside from one (Juror #8), vote guilty – and they also make it clear that they plan to deliver said verdict without forethought, on Henry Fonda (Juror #8) is the opposing vote of not guilty. His vote of not guilty

In Reginald Rose’s 12 Angry Men there is a clear juror whom swayed the others and directly expressed his ideas. He is a “gentle man...who wants justice to be done.” Juror no.8 is the hero as his initial choice to vote not guilty locks in the boy's fate of escaping a life of prison and punishment; not excluding his persuasiveness and ideology of the morality of the other jurors. Juror no.8 single handedly voted against the grain and convinced other jurors of his logical reasons ‘it’s not easy for me to raise my hand and send a boy of to die before talking about it first’. It was heroic of him to stand out against the others and the dramatic conclusion greatly attributed to his significant factor as the vote sway from 11-1 guilty to 12-0 for not guilty. Juror no.8 helped conveyed to the other jurors the boy's innocence. Persuading jurors in a chill mannerism whist jurors 3 and 10 were angry and impatient. Over the case juror no.8 was calm and reviewed the evidence taken from the prosecution and it's flaws. Juror no.8 constantly reviewed the evidence with other jurors presenting logical

Initially, Juror 8 stands alone during the first vote. For clarification, he doesn’t cower and change his initial vote when he notices that all the other people in the room are against him. Eight didn’t succumb to peer pressure and made it his duty to ensure everyone else sees what he does. Second, Juror 5 changed his vote from “guilty” to “not guilty” because he realised how much the accused has in common with his own upbringing. For instance, both of them grew up in the slums and were often negatively stereotyped. People tend to agree with others if they find something that they have in common. Lastly, Juror 11 called Juror 7 out for misusing his freedoms as an American citizen and his responsibilities as a Juror of the court. Being that Juror Seven only changed his vote because he had tickets to a play, Juror 11 was enraged, mainly because not everyone has the same opportunities as they do at the moment. When Juror 11 lived in Europe, he never had opportunities like this so he was taking it seriously, especially because the life of someone else was in jeopardy. Quite often literature mirrors real life, as is the case with the recent shooting in Las Vegas when complete strangers risked their own safety or put their own lives on hold to help when others were in

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

Although a lot of evidence was really convincing, he tried to prove it unconvincing and use sarcasm to convince other jurors otherwise. One example of #7 using sarcasm would be this quote: "Why don't we have them run the trial over..." I think this quote clearly shows that juror #7 is trying to convince other jurors, that court's evidence proves the young man is guilty without reasonable doubt. Also to break #8's spirit he used name calling, another kind of peer pressure. I believe this is a very good example: "The boy is guilty pal, like the nose on your face." The third and last juror I picked was #8, he was not using sarcasm, nor was he muscle flexing, he was using reasonable argument, which helped him convince all the jurors that the young man was innocent. He did not try to convince anybody by screaming at him, on the contrary he tried to go over all the evidence, and he was using intelligent thinking, like trying to calculate exact times, and figure out the correct position of the switch-blade in the chest of the father. He was also trying to recreate a situation to see if indeed one of the witnesses on the stand was lying.

Juror No. 8 wasn’t trying to defend the boy he was just doing his job, because of that he slowly became a hero without knowing it. Juror No. 8 could of went and decide to choose guilty but he didn’t because he knows it wouldn’t be right not even sharing a thought about it. He continued to convince all eleven jurors that their was reasonable doubt and that the boy was

And yet, when I got in that room; Meeting Jurors #7 and #3, and their bigoted and xenophobically racist ideals, I was extremely overwhelmed that they could let such men have such important roles, I even said to Juror #7 “I do not think you have the right to play like this with a man's life. This is an ugly and terrible thing to do.” Because he was voting guilty because he had some baseball tickets and didn’t want to miss the game! To be honest; I was absolutely furious.

Hostility is illustrated with the loud, verbal reactions of Jurors 3 and 10, and by Juror 7 when he becomes defensive about his ability to make a important decision so quickly. In attempt to diffuse this growing conflict, Juror 12 suggests to the Foreman, the formal leader of the group, that they should each take a turn explaining their reason for voting 'Guilty'. The potential for cohesiveness emerges during this time, as group members are invited to share their opinions and everyone is provided with an opportunity to be heard. However, conflict continues to grow as Juror 10 talks out of order and interrupts by shouting at other members.

This was the first time juror 11 got angry, which seems like an unusual thing for him to do. He pointed out that a man's life is at stake and that the juror should definately have a very good reason for voting "guilty" or "not guilty". After which, juror 7 became hesitant and not so sure of himself. I think at that point he started to become embarrassed about his words and his actions and the evaluation apprehension theory might have been the

Juror 4 was able to communicate his ideas and thought like a professional and did so in an organised fashion. He analysed each piece of evidence with care and used logic and his skills of deduction to guide his vote. Rose intended for the audience to realise that the not guilty vote was the right choice and used Juror 4 as a catalyst for the final vote change.

Twelve jurors come in to a stuffy, hot, jury room after listening to a very long trial about a 17 year old boy that is being tried for murder They make small talk before actually discussing the case, one juror mentions how hot it is and another makes a comment on how she never would have known that if she hadn’t told her, which is a very rude sarcastic comment. After the first vote we immediately we see the juror who is in “left field”, being the only one in the room who votes not guilty. We see that throughout the next couple lines that juror number 3 is the exact opposite of juror 8, they are both very confident in their opinion but differ in how they express it. Juror 8 doesn’t want to send a boy off to die without talking about it first. They proceed to bring

I think the guy is guilty. You couldn’t change my mind if you spoke for a hundred years.” (7th Juror - p.7) As the play goes on and more and more people start to vote ‘not guilty’ along with the 8th Juror the more passionate Jurors become even angrier.