Prejudice is the unjustified negative attitudes or prejudgments that some people hold against others of certain groups (Gale, 2016). Prejudice makes its way into every aspect of our lives, and importantly, in the justice system. Generally, characteristics such as age, gender, or background are prejudiced against the most. It has several causes, such as family beliefs, religious customs, cultural traditions and most importantly, societal beliefs and experiences. Moreover, the issue of prejudice can easily be identified within the justice system. Twelve Angry Men by Reginald Rose, clearly shows prejudice in within the justice system by the jurors towards a young, Hispanic male on trial for the murder of his father. In the novel Monster, by Walter …show more content…
The cycle of prejudice in the justice system begins within society and our daily experiences, which secondly makes its way into the courtroom, where the opinions of decision influencers and decision makers are affected. When this happens, prejudice is ultimately what causes a negative impact against those on trial, in the final decision making process. Prejudice is a major issue that begins in society. It has negative impacts for many individuals, and can have a major negative impact on those in the justice system. One of the main reasons this happens is because of negative or incorrect prejudgments, caused by beliefs made by society, and the experiences of individuals. Within the justice system, young males, usually of colour are most often affected by prejudice. In Monster, the quote from Miss O’Brien “Half of those jurors, … believed you were guilty the …show more content…
Usually, if the final verdict is affected by prejudice the verdict will be guilty. This can happen through the prejudices of jurors, judges, prosecutors or attorneys. In Monster, it is subtly implied that Steve’s defence attorney, Kathy O’Brien, is prejudiced towards him. On page 10 of Monster, Steve refers to his attorney as “Kathy O’Brien, … Defence Attorney with doubts.” This implies that her doubts are caused by her prejudiced opinions. This character’s prejudiced opinions could have had a major impact on the final verdict, by letting it weaken her defence. The verdict can also be finalised by those opinions, by making their way into the minds of the judges, prosecutors or jurors. This is similar in 12 Angry Men, as juror threes opinions could have easily been passed through to the other jurors. Towards the end of the play, the juror still refuses to change his vote from ‘guilty’ to ‘not guilty’. This implies that he is still letting his prejudiced opinions follow him as evidence for his verdict. On page 72 of the play, juror ten gives a long speech as to why he believes the defendant cannot be proven innocent. He refuses to believe the defendant is innocent because he again relates his opinions to his personal experiences with his son. Although the verdict concludes to be ‘not guilty’ in both the play and the novel, prejudice can affect other cases much differently. Other
In the 1930’s a plethora of prejudiced persons are present amidst the prominent Scottsboro trials, a seven-year-long case consisting of false rape allegations made against nine black boys from Scottsboro. When citizens fail to acknowledge their own preconceived ideas and look past the prejudice present in society, justice cannot be served. In the Scottsboro case, the court of Alabama disregards the societal issues surrounding racial discrimination and endorses the guilty verdict and conviction of the nine African American boys. Failing to look past their own personal biases, the jury ignores the unquestionable evidence that would support the boys’ case. Instead, the jury focuses on their predilection
Jury Bias With jury bias we examined that the perspective taking, victim impact statements and race of the victim had no main effects with ps > 0.26 and no significant interactions with ps > 0.64. Jury Race The race of the jury was divided into white and non-white participants. An ANOVA was then run with perspective taking, victim impact statements, and race of the victim as the between-participants factors to test against empathy felt for the defendant, for the victim, for the victim’s significant others. White participants. We observed that there was a main effect with the race of the jury and the empathy felt by the jury for the victim.
Prejudice is a dreadful mindset that people can perceive from another person by their first look. As long as human race roams the Earth, prejudge mental will never cease. However long that we as people stay here on Earth is how long prejudice will last. We frustratingly try to obliterate prejudice, but it always upheaval back with maximum force. People take into consideration peoples race and ethnicity, and if it is diverse from theirs, then that person is probably prejudice towards them in any other ways, shape, or form. Prejudice has been with Mankind since the beginning of the human revolution. The simplest example of prejudice is when it comes to black and white revolution. Since colored human race were slaves in the beginning of American
“Most modem sentencing systems in the United States express an explicit commitment to ensuring that a defendant 's sentence is not affected by the defendant 's race or gender (Hessick, 2010).” Even though individuals are protected through the Bill of Rights and Sentencing Reform Acts, there are still disparities in sentencing within the criminal justice systems. Often, race and gender bias negatively affects sentencing.
The reason for these reactions is due to the fact that jurors are all influenced by different decision making abilities. These abilities can be shaped by varying emotional reactions to case information, jurors intelligence, their abilities to retain certain information, and of course their own personal and cultural views. As a result, jurors establish different perceptions and opinions despite all the jurors being given the same information. The procedure of applying a juror’s perception of certain views on life and how those views apply to the facts and information being presented to them in the case are the main forces behind each juror’s individual conclusions on the case. Jurors seem to rarely alter their opinions on how they feel about a certain case, but they may change their minds on how things should have been presented to them. This can be observed in the participation and comments of the jurors in this certain case.
They are the impartial third-party whose responsibility is to deliver a verdict for the accused based on the evidence presented during trial. They balance the rights of society to a great extent as members of the community are involved. This links the legal system with the community and ensures that the system is operating fairly and reflecting the standards and values of society. A trial by jury also ensures the victim’s rights to a fair trial. However, they do not balance the rights of the offender as they can be biased or not under. In the News.com.au article ‘Judge or jury? Your life depends on this decision’ (14 November 2013), Ian Lloyd, QC, revealed that “juries are swayed by many different factors.” These factors include race, ethnicity, physical appearance and religious beliefs. A recent study also found that juries are influenced by where the accused sits in the courtroom. They found that a jury is most likely to give a “guilty” verdict if the accused sits behind a glass dock (ABC News, 5 November 2014). Juries also tend to be influenced by their emotions; hence preventing them from having an objective view. According to the Sydney Morning Herald article ‘Court verdicts: More found innocent if no jury involved’ (23 November 2013), 55.4 per cent of defendants in judge-alone trials were acquitted of all charges compared with 29 per cent in jury trials between 1993 and 2011. Professor Mark Findlay from the University of Sydney said that this is because “judges were less likely to be guided by their emotions.” Juries balance the rights of victims and society to a great extent. However, they are ineffective in balancing the rights of the offender as juries can be biased which violate the offender’s rights to have a fair
There are many examples throughout “The Monsters Are Due On Maple Street” that show that prejudice is a human flaw. According to Les Goodman, “You were so quick to kill, Charlie, and you were so quick to tell us who we had to be careful off. Well maybe you had to kill. Maybe Peter there was trying to tell us something. Maybe he’d found out something
It is normal to believe that the United States has, first and foremost, the idea of the essential dignity of individual human beings, the equality of all men, and certain inalienable rights to freedom. What keeps a majority of people skeptical is the oppression and biased conclusions that have been observed in the criminal justice system the last few years. The Sentencing Project, a non-profit organization that is criminal justice oriented, published a report named “Reducing Racial Disparity in the Criminal Justice System: A Manual for Practitioners and Policymakers” which contains enough statistics to consider the decisions taken by the criminal justice system as suspicious or questionable. “Minorities charged with felonies were more likely to be detained than whites,” the report stated, creating an evident discrepancy between the unbalanced equations of equal justice (para #5). To support this idea, the report mentions, “A black male born in 2001 has a 32% chance of spending time in prison at some point in his life, a Hispanic male has a 17% chance, and a white male has a 6% chance.” The entanglement between the judicial decision and the ethnicity or skin color is becoming not an assumption but a reality. Last but not least, it states that DNA testing indicates that a 63% of African American people are exonerated, meaning that
Discrimination against the minority population is a major problem in the United States society’s justice system. There are many examples where African American and low-income minorities are treated differently and not given the chance to prove their innocence. The law enforcement promises to treat all men or women equal opportunity, but the same system has put 120,000 innocent African Americans in prison. While most of them still remain in prisons, injustice by law enforcements is still a burden to the minorities in America. Moreover, wrongful conviction is a horrible injustice when a person spends years in jail. This is getting recognized by the U.S. system but often late. In many cases by the time a person is proven innocent, he or she might
The book “12 Angry Men” by Reginald Rose is a book about twelve jurors who are trying to come to a unanimous decision about their case. One man stands alone while the others vote guilty without giving it a second thought. Throughout the book this man, the eighth juror, tries to provide a fair trial to the defendant by reviewing all the evidence. After reassessing all the evidence presented, it becomes clear that most of the men were swayed by each of their own personal experiences and prejudices. Not only was it a factor in their final decisions but it was the most influential variable when the arbitration for the defendant was finally decided.
Prejudice is an issue that cannot be easily avoided in today's society. It has and always will have a huge impact on the discrimination that some people face based on religion, appearance, background, mental/physical disabilities and etc.
Prejudice, the act of judging someone based on outward appearance or social standing. In the 1960’s Harper Lee wrote a book called To Kill a Mockingbird, about prejudice and how hard the times were. In To Kill a Mockingbird, there are many examples of prejudice showing how morally wrong it was. There are several examples of prejudice in the book: Tom Robinson because he is African American, Boo Radley because of his standing in their society, and the Cunningham Family because of how poor they were. The following paragraphs will discuss these examples.
Jr., Bernard E. Whitley and Mary E. Kite. The Psychology of Prejudice and Discrimination. Belmont: Cengage Learning, 2010. Web.
Prejudice meaning pre-judging someone and having an unwarranted bias occurs often in today’s society and has been around since the beginning of time. Prejudice can effect people’s decisions and have an unfair impact on society. The text ‘To kill a mocking-bird’ written by Harper Lee and the movie ‘Philadelphia’ directed by Jonathon Demme explore this idea thoroughly.
576). In 12 Angry Men, the jury that is voting is a death-qualified jury and all but one wants to convict. They are more prejudiced towards this Hispanic boy who could very well be innocent. In Young’s (2004) study, he proved that death-qualified juries were more likely to have prejudiced views of minorities that they are more willing to convict. In this study, he took a poll that resulted in the death-qualified juries saying that it is worse to let the guilty go free than to convict an innocent person. In both the film and Young’s (2004) study, it is shown that death-qualified juries are very quick to convict when they have someone’s life in their