Are Criminal Cases Won or Lost on the Evidence, or on the Stories that Are Told - Coursework Example

Are Criminal Cases Won or Lost on the Evidence, or on the Stories That Are Told? Introduction Griffin p.281) argues that a crime occurs when one has obeyed the laws through acts of omissions that are punishable by law. He also notes that crime is one of the social ills facing many societies in the world. This is because even a day hardly passes without a criminal incidence being reported in the media. Despite the fact that crime is mainly associated with poverty, findings reveals that crime is everywhere even in developed countries in the world. As such, these countries also have criminal courts that help in dealing with criminal cases, as and when reported. In the U.S., for instance, the ruling of Simpson’s murder case still remains fresh on the minds of many Americans and the world at large. This paper will discuss the extent to which criminal cases ruled on evidence and stories, as well as whether criminal cases are won or lost based on either evidence or stories. Generally, the responsibility of proving that an individual has committed a crime rests with the government prosecutor in most countries. However, going by past cases, proving a criminal case is one of the most daunting tasks. Pennington and Hastie (1988, p.6) note that the process of proving a criminal case usually starts with the arrest of a criminal suspect by a law enforcement officers, followed by arraignment in the court. However, as the law enforcement officers makes arrest, they are required to gather sufficient evidence to be used during the trial stages in an attempt to prove the culpability of the suspect to the alleged crime as observed by Pennington and Hastie (1988, p.6). The trial, however, commence once the suspect has pleaded not guilty to the charges brought against him after the preliminary hearing. At this stage, the prosecutor is required to provide enough evidence linking the accused to the alleged crime. Evidence in this case is anything produced in a court of law by prosecutor, plaintiff or the defendant that proves or disapproves an allegation in a case according to Griffin (2013, p.282). In other words, it is what the judges hear during a criminal trial that help them establish whether the person accused is guilty or innocent. Evidence exist in different forms namely witness testimony, forensic evidence or anything that can assist the jury in proving the guilt or innocence of the accused. Generally, a case that does not show any enough evidence ends up being dismissed at the pretrial stage, therefore, not allowed proceeding to the next stage. This implies that a criminal case is won on the basis of the evidence provided and not merely on the stories told during a criminal trial as noted by Gardner and Anderson (2009, p.20). A story in a criminal case refers to statements made by either the defense team or the plaintiff or the prosecutor as regards the alleged crime without any attached evidence. A story mainly entails explaining the events as they happened from the beginning to the end without necessarily providing evidence to prove how true story is (Gardner and Anderson 2009, p.21). For instance, a story may involve narrating to the court of the events of a robbery case including how it began the events that took place, and how it ended. This may include telling a story of how robbers entered someone’s shop and rob them of their properties. However, as much as story telling is important in a case, courts do not rely fully on the stories being told either by the plaintiff or the defendant. Instead, courts mainly rely on evidence produced to support the stories told, notes Griffin (2013, p.281). This is because it is not easy for one to believe every story told. For instance, when a robber enters the premises of another person’s premises, apart from just narrating how the events happened, one should be able to provide concrete evidence capable of proving beyond a reasonable doubt that the robber did commit the crime for which he is alleged to have committed. Therefore, it becomes clear that winning or losing a criminal case is dependent on the evidence given rather than stories told. In this case, Gardner and Anderson (2009, p.24) noted that, the stronger the evidence, the higher the chance of winning a criminal case while the weaker the evidence, the higher the possibility of losing a criminal case under the court of law. This is because judges rely mainly on the strength of the evidence provided the prosecutor of the plaintiff and the strength of the defense provided to dispel the allegation. Therefore, it is very important for the prosecutor for any criminal case to ensure that there is enough evidence capable of proving the case beyond a reasonable doubt that alleged crime did occur that require incrimination of the accused person. Failure to do this will constitute lack of evidence that might easily lead to dismissal of a case that can easily be won by the provision of sufficient evidence. However, there are a number of reasons why a case may lack evidences leading to the dismissal of the case. Firstly, a party may have evidence but the evidence is considered inadmissible in the court of law under the evidence rule. A typical example is where a law enforcement officer enters someone’s premises illegally and conducts a search without any warrant. Any evidence obtained by the police under such circumstances cannot be relied upon by the court due to illegality. At the same time, under the “fruit of the poison tree,” any evidence obtained through coercion and illegal search is inadmissible and constitute lack of evidence (Gardner and Anderson 2009, p.24). Further, a party to a criminal case may lack evidence for not being in a position to prove his or her case beyond a reasonable doubt. For instance, a crime may be alleged to have occurred but the prosecutor is unable to produce enough evidence that may be required to be able to prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt that the suspect did commit the crime alleged, notes Gardner and Anderson (2009, p.26). In others, it may be difficult for the prosecutor to link the defendant to the crime due to lack of evidence. Further, the plaintiff may not be in a position to produce evidence linking the accused to the alleged crime. Therefore, any party to a criminal case without evidence cannot win a case as noted by Gardner and Anderson (2009, p.26). This because each party to a case has some burden of proof. For example, in a criminal case, the law confers upon the prosecutor the burden of proving his case beyond a reasonable doubt that the accused did commit the alleged crime. At the same time, the defendant also has the burden of proving his defense beyond a reasonable doubt in order for the case to be dismissed for lack of sufficient evidence. The importance of evidence in winning or losing a case in a criminal case can be demonstrated using Simpson’s case, the most publicized murder case. In this case, O.J. Simpson was arrested by detective and arraigned in a Los Angeles court for the murder of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her colleague Ronald Goldma ion June 1994. However after several months of trial, the jury handling the case found Simpson not guilty for the alleged murder due to lack of sufficient evidence linking him to the case. This was after Simpson pleaded not guilty in which the prosecutor was required to prove beyond a reasonable doubt by producing sufficient evidence linking Simpson to the murder (Schuetz and Lilley 1999, p.14-16). What is evident is that the prosecutor did everything within his means to prove Simpson’s guilt. This is evident from the list of evidences the prosecutor produced to convince the jury of Simpson’s guilt. The first evidence produced by the prosecutor during the trail was the 9-1-1 call and backing it up with Simpson’s violent history towards his wife. The second evidence was the hair evidence, which the prosecutor alleged to have been consistent with that of Simpson found at Bundy residence. This hair evidence was found to be consistent with that found on the shirt of Ron Goldman. Other evidences produced included bloodstain evidence, glove evidence, shoe evidence, Simpson’s flight to Bronco, DNA evidence, and his strange reaction to the phone call informing him of his wife’s death (Schuetz and Lilley 1999, p.14-16). However, despite these attempts to produce evidence-linking Simpson to the murders, the jury found him not guilty for the alleged crime. This was due to the fact that the prosecution team failed to provide enough evidence to prove a beyond reasonable doubt that Simpson was indeed guilty for the killing according to Schuetz and Lilley (1999, p.17). However, despite the ruling that many people did not agree with following its wide media coverage, Simpson later confessed in his 2007 novel, If I did I as noted by It according to Schuetz and Lilley (1999, p.14-16). In this book, Simpson narrated all the events that led to the killing of his victims, the tactics he used to commit the crime and how he concealed the evidence. This case plus many other cases shows that winning or losing a case depend on how well the plaintiff, or the prosecutor provide evidence linking the defendant to a criminal activity rather than just telling stories without facts. This is because in case the prosecuting team could have produced enough evidence proving beyond a reasonable doubt that Simpson was the killer of his wife and friend, then the jury could not have acquitted Simpson, a crime, which he later confessed having omitted. Despite Simpson’s case having been dismissed for lack of evidence, there are several cases that have been won by prosecutors proving beyond a reasonable doubt the guilt of the defendant by producing sufficient evidence. One such is the conviction of Albert Fish, the most famous cannibal and serial killer of all times as noted by Castleden (2011, p.82). Albert Fish was arrested after a letter wrote to the family of Grace Budd one of his victims, linked him to the killing. This was after about six years of searching for Budd’s whereabouts. However, despite initially pleading not guilty for the crime, the prosecution was able to produce the letter he wrote that proved the case beyond a reasonable doubt he was indeed the killer. During the trail, Fish defended himself arguing that he was insane at the time of murder according to Castleden (2011, p.82). His allegations were indeed confirmed by the psychiatrists who reported that he was insane when the murder occured. Nevertheless, the jury dismissed his defense as a mere storytelling arguing that he was sane, notes Castleden (2011, p.82). Relying on the evidence produced, the jury sentenced Fish for death through electrocution, which did take place on 16 June 1936. What can be noted here is that in Fish could have been able to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he was indeed insane at the time of killing his victims then he could have won the case and avoided been condemned to death. Differences between evidence and stories in criminal cases Evidence differs widely from stories in a criminal case. As earlier stated, while evidence is provided in a criminal case to help the jury in determining the guilt or innocence of a person, stories are told to brief the jury on the circumstances of the case and the events transpired. This implies that criminal cases are won or lost mainly based on the strength and credibility of evidence provided and not on stories (Gardner and Anderson 2009, p.36). Evidence also differs from stories in that, whereas stories are narrated verbally, evidence exists in different forms with some physical in nature. For example, evidence in a criminal case may exist in the form of bloodstain, cloths, or weapons found at the crime scene or even shoes. Other evidences, however, requires expert services such as DNA determination in a criminal case or forensic evidence obtained with the help of computer and forensic experts from a crime scene. As earlier noted, all these forms of evidence are vital in proving a case before a jury (Gardner and Anderson 2009, p.36). Conclusion It is a parent that evidence and stories are both elements used in deciding the quilt or innocence of a suspect in a criminal proceeding. Nevertheless, evidence is the most vital as far as proving whether the accused person is guilty or not. This is because judges mainly rule in accordance with the strength of the evidence provided by prosecutors in a criminal case. This is based on the concept of burden of proof, which requires the prosecution to prove his case beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant committed the crime as alleged. Evidence in this case may consist of physical evidence or evidence obtained from experts such as DNA samples and forensic evidence. Therefore, it is very important for the prosecutor of any criminal case to ensure that there is sufficient evidence linking the accused to a given crime before instituting a criminal case. Failure to do this may result in the dismissal of the case on the ground of lack of enough evidence as required by courts. At the same time, since the law also confers the burden of proof on the defendant, it is imperative for the defense team to be able to mount a strong defense to dispel the allegation and the able to prove his innocence. This is based on the fact that sometimes one may be mistaken and arraigned in court for a crime committed by another person. References Bennett, W.L., & Feldman, M.S. (1981), Reconstructing reality in the courtroom: justice and judgment in American culture. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press. Castleden, C. (2011), Albert Fish: The lying cannibal. New York, NY: Constable & Robinson Ltd. Gardner, T.J., & Anderson T.M. (2009), Criminal evidence: principles and cases. Belmont: CA: Cengage Learning. Griffin, L.K. (2013) ‘Narrative, Truth, Trial’. The Georgetown Law Journal 101:281-335. Pennington, N. & Hastie, R. (1988) ‘Explanation-based decision-making: Effects of Memory Structure on. Schuetz, J.E., & Lilley L.S. (1999), The O.J. Simpson trials: Rhetoric, media, and the law. New York, NY: SIU Press. Read More