The Nature Of Lawful Defenses, Justification, Excuses,

11. Juror Eight says he had a peculiar feeling about this trial. What does he think was wrong?

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 grand jury is a pre-protected customary law organization, and an established apparatus in its own privilege only grasping custom-based law. The procedure applies to the states to the degree that the states have consolidated fantastic juries or potentially customary law. Most states have an option common process. "In spite of the fact that state frameworks of criminal methodology vary enormously among themselves, the great jury is correspondingly ensured by many

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.

The idea of blame, defined as, “A particular kind of response (e.g. emotion), to a person, at fault, for a wrongful action,” plays a significant role in the study of crime, with respect to degrees of “fault.” In most modern societies, “criminal culpability,” or degrees of wrongdoing, makes a difference between the kinds of punishment one receives for his action(s). To be culpable for a crime, there must be a guilty act (Actus Rea), and a guilty mind (Mens Rea). Degrees of culpability often depends on the kind of mental state, (Mens Rea), one brings to the act in which he engaged. How much one is blameworthy for wrongful conduct depends in part on the state of mind in relation to the wrongful conduct. One’s mental state while engaging in wrongful conduct, which in a legal sense is determined by legislators, is characterized by the following terms: purposely, knowingly, recklessly and negligence.

The prosecution, representing the U.S. Government, calls the first witness. A N.I.S. (Naval Investigative Service) officer states that he received a letter from the victim, Private First Class William T Santiago, requesting a transfer off the base. In exchange, the victim would provide evidence of an illegal shooting over the fence line. The offender of the fence line shooting was Lance Cpl. Dawson. The prosecution was trying to show motive by their line of questioning. The defense makes the point

“The first count involved all seven members, who were found guilty of knowingly and intentionally combine, conspire, confederate and agree with each other and others, both known and unknown to the grand jury, to distribute and possess with intent to distribute a mixture or substance containing a detectable amount of cocaine base

Many cases require alternate defences for those who suffer from mental disorders, this defence is known as Not Criminally Responsible on Account of Mental Disorder also known as NCRMD. A defence such as this is used to explain that the perpetrator had a disorder that made them unaware of the crime they had committed and that the crime was wrong. Applying NCRMD as a defence can be difficult as there are many requirements a person needs to meet before they are deemed not responsible. In some cases, it is hard to prove that the offender had a mental disorder at the time of the crime and that it is a valid defence as to why they committed the crime unknowingly. There is a lot of discussion around NCRMD being successful or unsuccessful and what should happen to the offender if they are deemed NCRMD. A recent case where NCRMD was used as a defence and was successful, was in the case of David Siu. NCRMD is a successful and valid defence if it is used in the right case to protect those in the system with mental disoders.

2. Case Facts: On October 13, 1979, George Schnopps fatally shot his wife of 14 years. The victim and schnopps began having marital problems six months prior, when schnopps became suspicious that his wife was seeing another man. A few days prior to the incident, Schnopps threatened to make his wife suffer. On October 12, 1979 while at work asked a coworker to buy him a gun, telling the worker that he had been receiving threatening phone calls. Schnopps paid his coworker for the gun and ammunition. On the day of the incident, Schnopps told a neighbor he was going to call his wife and have her come pick up some things, and asked if them to keep the youngest child with her so he could talk to with his wife. When the wife went over Schnopps tried to convince his wife to stay with him, in response the wife made some vulgar comments which triggered Schnopps. He then shot her and then shot himself. Shortly after he called the neighbor and told her what had happened and she called the police. The defense offered evidence from friends and coworkers who noticed difference in Schnopps physical and emotional health after the victim had left him. The Commonwealth’s expert

Black, the defendants’ attorney, picked up Parson and his wife from an apartment building not far from the court house. Parson had been in hiding since the attack and it was never deserved as to where he went. The police say he went to Arkansas, but it was never confirmed to be true. Parson as well as the other defendants pleaded not guilty to the accusations because the evidence against them was almost extremely weak. Although they prosecutors had little evidence the grand jury convicted the men for conspiracy of murder. It was not hard for the jury to make this conclusion since a majority of the accused men were Russian immigrants, and at the time they were being labeled as terrorist across the nation. Despite being accused Parson and Spies spent the night in a cell together laughing and looking back on how they never gave up on what they believed in.

The evidence presented in front of the Grand Jury told a whole different story where the events resembled more of an attack from the police on an unsuspecting Fred Hampton asleep in his bed. Reports presented to the Grand Jury showed that as little as one percent of the shots that day had actually been fired from the inside of the apartment. This caused even greater outraged in the community.

The real issue in the grand jury's decision to not indict is not even the actions of the officers who chose to confront a potentially armed child head-on instead of setting up a ways back and talking to him. The issue is not the "seconds" that it took for the shooting to take place. The issue is whether or not the prosecutor even wanted the grand jury to move forward and look at the officers' behavior and potential liability.

The rule states, " A defendant may be excused from criminal responsibility if at the time of the commission of the act, the party accused was laboring under such a defect of reason, from a disease of mind, as not to know the nature and the quality of the act he was doing..." (3)

Though the offender still believes that crime in general is wrong, they will justify or excuse their crime as necessary, morally correct or otherwise acceptable. Offenders might suggest that their crime was acceptable because they are not responsible (“Denial of Responsibility”), no harm occurred (Denial of Injury), the victim deserved to be victimized (“Denial of Victim”), the authorities have it out for them (Condemnation of the Condemners) or there is a higher good served by their actions (“Appeal to Higher Loyalties”). The offender in all of these cases recognizes that their actions were deviant, but argue that it was justified (Sykes and Matza , 2011). Under these theories, humans are considered to naturally want to commit crime, but generally believe that crime is wrong. When they do offend, they consider their offense to be justified exceptions to their belief in the wrongness of crime, the result of a lack of self-control or social bond.

Reporters rely on sources to provide the news they publish, and those sources might not want to share information out of fear that they’ll get in trouble for sharing it. Privileges in reporter were developed to protect journalists. Reporter 's privilege in the United States is the protection that a reporter has under constitutional law from being forced to reveal their confidential information or sources in court. It may be described in the US as the First Amendment right given to journalists to protect their private sources from being exposed.