Proof Beyond a Reasonable Doubt in Criminal Trials

In the United States court system, the fair and impartial delivery of justice is based on two fundamental tenets: That all persons accused of crimes are considered to be innocent until proven guilty, and that their guilt must be proven â€Å"beyond a reasonable doubt.† While the requirement that guilt must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt is meant to protect the rights of Americans charged with crimes, it often leaves juries with the momentous task of answering the often subjective question — how much doubt is â€Å"reasonable doubt?† Constitutional Basis for Beyond a Reasonable Doubt Under the Due Process Clauses of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, persons accused of crimes are protected from â€Å"conviction except upon proof beyond a reasonable doubt of every fact necessary to constitute the crime with which he is charged.† The U.S. Supreme Court first acknowledged the concept in its decision on the 1880 case of Miles v. United States: â€Å"The evidence upon which a jury is justified in returning a verdict of guilty must be sufficient to produce a conviction of guilt, to the exclusion of all reasonable doubt.† While judges are required to instruct juries to apply the reasonable doubt standard, legal experts disagree on whether the jury should also be given a quantifiable definition of â€Å"reasonable doubt.† In the 1994 case of Victor v. Nebraska, the Supreme Court ruled that the reasonable doubt instructions given to juries must be clear, but declined to specify a standard set of such instructions. As a result of Victor v. Nebraska ruling, the various courts have created their own reasonable doubt instructions. For example, judges of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals instruct juries that, â€Å"A reasonable doubt is a doubt based upon reason and common sense and is not based purely on speculation. It may arise from a careful and impartial consideration of all the evidence, or from lack of evidence.† Considering the Quality of Evidence As part of their â€Å"careful and impartial consideration† of evidence presented during the trial, jurors must also evaluate the quality of that evidence. While first-hand evidence such as eyewitness testimony, surveillance tapes, and DNA matching help eliminate doubts of guilt, jurors assume — and are typically reminded by defense attorneys — that witness may lie, photographic evidence can be faked, and DNA samples can become tainted or mishandled. Short of voluntary or legally-obtained confessions, most evidence is open to being challenged as invalid or circumstantial, thus helping to establish â€Å"reasonable doubt† in the minds of the jurors. Reasonable Does Not Mean All As in most other criminal courts, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court also instructs jurors that proof beyond a reasonable doubt is a doubt that leaves them â€Å"firmly convinced† that the defendant is guilty. Perhaps most importantly, jurors in all courts are instructed that beyond a â€Å"reasonable† doubt does not mean beyond â€Å"all† doubt. As Ninth Circuit judges state it, â€Å"It is not required that the government (the prosecution) proves guilt beyond all possible doubt.† Finally, judges instruct jurors that after their â€Å"careful and impartial† consideration of the evidence they have seen, they are not convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant actually committed the crime as charged, it is their duty as jurors to find the defendant not guilty. Can Reasonable Be Quantified? Is it even possible to assign a definite numeric value to such a subjective, opinion-driven concept as reasonable doubt? Over the years, legal authorities have generally agreed that proof â€Å"beyond a reasonable doubt† requires jurors to be at least 98% to 99% certain that the evidence proves the defendant to be guilty. This is in contrast to civil trials on lawsuits, in which a lower standard of proof, known as a â€Å"preponderance of the evidence† is required. In civil trials, a party might prevail with little as 51% probability that events involved actually occurred as claimed. This rather wide discrepancy in the standard of proof required can be best explained by the fact that persons found guilty in criminal trials face far more severe potential punishment — from jail time to death — compared to the monetary penalties typically involved in civil trials. In general, defendants in criminal trials are afforded more constitutionally-ensured protections than defendants in civil trials.   The Reasonable Person Element In criminal trials, jurors are often instructed to decide whether the defendant is guilty or not by applying an objective test in which the defendant’s actions are compared to those of a â€Å"reasonable person† acting under similar circumstances. Basically, would any other reasonable person have done the same things the defendant did? This â€Å"reasonable person† test is often applied in trials involving so-called â€Å"stand your ground† or â€Å"castle doctrine† laws that justify the use of deadly force in acts of self-defense. For example, would a reasonable person have also chosen to shoot his or her attacker under the same circumstances or not? Of course, such a â€Å"reasonable† person is little more than a fictional ideal based on the individual juror’s opinion of how a â€Å"typical† person, possessing ordinary knowledge and prudence, would act in certain circumstances. According to this standard, most jurors naturally tend to consider themselves to be reasonable people and thus judge the defendant’s conduct from a viewpoint of, â€Å"What would I have done?† Since the test of whether a person has acted as a reasonable person is an objective one, it does not take into account the particular abilities of the defendant. As a result, defendants who have shown a low level of intelligence or have habitually acted carelessly are held to the same standards of conduct as more intelligent or careful persons, or as the ancient legal principle holds, â€Å"Ignorance of the law excuses no one.† Why the Guilty Sometimes Go Free If all persons accused of crimes must be considered innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, and that even the slightest degree of doubt can sway even a reasonable person’s opinion of a defendant’s guilt, doesn’t the American criminal justice system occasionally allow guilty people to go free? Indeed it does, but this is entirely by design. In crafting the various provisions of the Constitution protecting rights of the accused, the Framers felt it essential that America apply the same standard of justice expressed by renowned English jurist William Blackstone in his often-cited 1760s work, Commentaries on the Laws of England, â€Å"It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer.†

Supply and Demand - 989 Words

Supply and Demand: Vacation to a theme park The supply and demand of goods and services vary due to various factors. This paper will discuss the supply and demand of vacation to a theme park and the various factors which affect them. First, there are many reasons why people wish to go on a vacation to a theme park. The many reasons include the fun and entertainment which can be experienced at the theme parks and also the family bonds that can be formed at the theme parks. Price is definitely a factor for people when making a decision to have a vacation at a theme park. In line with the law of demand, when prices are high, people will be less able and willing to spend on a vacation to a theme park. On the other hand, when prices are low,†¦show more content†¦Vacation to a theme park can be complemented by various goods and services. One of which will be air tickets. For example, when prices of air tickets fall, demand for air tickets will increase. In addition, people will be more attracted to flying to the theme park to spend a vacation there. Similarly, another complement good is hotels. When hotel rates fall, people are more able and willing to live in a hotel and thus will be able to afford to stay in the hotels in or near the theme park. Given that a vacation to a theme park is more of a luxury good and not a necessity, people will not spend their money on it unless they have extra disposable income or high purchasing power for they would rather use the money on basic necessities first. As such, demand for a vacation at a theme park is highly price elastic. This means that when prices increase, demand for the product will decrease more than proportionately and the organization will experience a decline in profits. On the other hand, when prices decreases, demand for the product will increase more than proportionately and the organization will experience an increase in profits. As such, theme park organizations need to be very careful about their pricing strategies for they can result in drastic effects on total revenue and profits which the organization can earn. In conclusion, there are various factors which affect the supply and demand of vacation to a theme park such as prices of substitutes, costs ofShow MoreRelatedSupply And Demand Of Demand1442 Words   |  6 Pages Supply and Demand Kimberly Jo DeVoy Western Governor’s University â€Æ' Supply and Demand A. Elasticity of demand represented as â€Å"Ed† is defined as a â€Å"measure of the response of a consumer to a change in price on the quantity demanded of a good† (McConnell, 2012). 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The Law with Teens and Nude Photos Free Essays

Composition 101 October 18, 2012 In Dahlia Lithwick’s article â€Å"Teens, Nude Photos and the Law†, she talks about how teen boys and girls are sending nude pictures to their boyfriends or girlfriends. They use their mobile devices like cell phones, ipod, computers and their cameras to send their nude image. She then addresses the consequences of the nude photo that the teenager has received. We will write a custom essay sample on The Law with Teens and Nude Photos or any similar topic only for you Order Now The teenager that received the photo can be charged with a felony of child pornography. The author then discusses why the teenager should not be treated harshly. She states that many of the teenagers are still immature and they don’t know the consequences of sending nude photos to each other. In her article she argues that the criminal justice system is taking it too far in charging the teenagers as child pornographers. I agree with the author because there is a real problem with criminalizing sexting as a form of child pornography. The teenagers caught with the photo will be charged with child pornography. Child pornography is a serious offence and can stay forever on your lifetime record and mess up your life. The majorities of the teenagers that are charged with the crime are not even predators, but a picture like has big consequences if it’s ever to get out on the internet. In my first argument, Dahlia Lithwick states that the teenagers are being punished to harshly. (Lithwick 492) She is right the charges against them are too severe. They can stay on their record for a long time or even forever. If the teenager would go look for a job and they were to pull up his records and they find that he has a child pornography offence, they won’t want to hire him. Who would want to hire a person who takes images of kids? It is a serious offence too people all over the world, but its a big charge just for a teen. Especially if that teen is a boy and receives a random photo on his cell phone and it’s a nude photo of his girlfriend and she is drunk. It’s not his fault that she is drunk. She is a drunk and underage girl. Teens don’t know any better. Many, well most of the teenagers are all still immature. Many think that being 18,17,16,15 they think they are grown when they really are not. Most all the teenagers don’t know fully what’s right from wrong. There mind is not fully developed and when something goes wrong the kids that think that there grown, go straight to their parents for help. That’s why they have grown parents to help them in life. That’s why all the judges that prosecuted the teens as child pornographers can’t forget that they were too once teenagers. The people that make up the criminal justice system can’t forget that they once too did stupid things when they were little. At least once they of had to receive on photo of their girlfriend or boyfriend nude. Many of the times the kids do it for fun. They think its being sexy. The kids these days are not the same as the kids from a long time ago. We have so much technology now, that it help us communicate better with people and not be able to do those things. Dahlia, in her article states â€Å"We seem to forget that kids can be as tech-savvy as Bill Gates but as gullible as Bambi. † (Lithwick 493). She is right, teenagers now a days are tech smart. They know how to handle a phone better than our parents. What teenagers don’t realize when taking bad images is that there putting themselves in a bad situations. There can be digital dating violence. They can use those images and put them on profiles like face book. Recently there was a page on face book of girls that are nude. The girls that were put out there were very upset and they wanted the site shut down. They were mad at the creator who made the site but it not his fault it’s the girls who took the images and gave it out. The site was out for a while and a lot of people got to see it. Right after pretty much the whole world saw it they finally took it down. Now the girls that were seen on the image are now marked for life or for a long time. People that know her will remember that she was in a bad photo. That’s when the teens realize that they did wrong but many still don’t learns there lesson. They are still going to be doing it because of relationship pressure. Most girls are the ones that are getting taken advantage off. The criminal justice system should change the way they label children as child pornographers. They are just making things worse. They need to find a way a better way to help solve the problem. Labeling children with these names are not going to help it stop. They need to show proof that its actually killing and hurting people emotionally. There have been many accounts of teens being depressed because of a bad photo. The system needs to stand up and help out the ones who are victims of these situations. They need to label the right people with these labels because teens are not dangerous. The older people can be charged as hild pornographers because they are grown and they know of what they are doing. Those are the only ones they should be charged. Over all, Dahlia Lithwick has a point, teens all over are being charged with child pornography for sending and receiving nude photos of their girlfriends. The police said that by sending nude photos girls can put them selves at risk and that has serious consequences so they put a severe consequence on them. They shouldn’t lab el them at a young age just for a nude photo, there teens, they can be immature. How to cite The Law with Teens and Nude Photos, Essay examples