Juror 8 Argumentative Essay

Similarly ,In Twelve Angry Men Juror 8 is a smart and moral juror who is willing to stand against all the other jurors for what he thinks is right. He is the main protagonist who believes a boy accused with murdering his father deserves a discussion prior to a guilty verdict. Although all the other jurors initially voted guilty, juror 8 believed that the jurors should not “send a boy off to die without talking about it first”(Juror 8, 12). Throughout the play Juror 8 combats the pressure from the other Jurors to just vote guilty and manages to convince his fellow Jurors one by one that there in fact is “reasonable doubt”(Judge, 6) and convinces them to arrive at a “not guilty”(Juror 3, 72) verdict. Reginald Rose extols Juror 8’s pursuit of justice through his success. Not only did Juror 8 stand by his principles and have the courage to stand against all the other Jurors, he also had the wits to convince his fellow jurors to change their verdict. Through these actions Juror 8 brings justice to the courts of New York city saving the life of a young boy.

Juror 3 was basing his failed relationship with his son on the accused boy. The reason that he had such a bad relationship with his son is because when the boy was young, he ran away from a fight and Juror 3 said: “I’m going to make a man out of you or I’m going to bust you up into little pieces trying”. Later on, when his son was older, they got into a fight and Juror 3 hasn’t seen him since. This experience probably left him the impression that all kids take their loved ones for granted, and that they deserve severe punishments. Juror 3 is not the type to provide the sharpest evidence or information, but he is very determined to prove that the accused really did murder the victim. Juror 8 practically gives nothing away about his real life, probably because he did not want to add his own prejudices to the case. Juror 3 gave both his ill-mannered personality and bigotry away in the play.

In a crowded jury room in downtown New York, opinions collide as discussion about the innocence of a young boy is decided. The dark and foreboding storm clouds that hang over the heads of the jurors are beginning to lift as time progresses and new facts are presented. One juror is not happy about this stay of execution and is holding fast his opinion of guilty. Juror three, the president of his business, refuses to alter his vote or opinion in any way. Still haunted by his own son, juror three verbally assaults the group with a forceful tone and a taciturn attitude. One of twelve, Reginald Rose created them all from the same pen and ink, and they could all be no more different.

A boy may die,” and changes his vote to “not guilty” which is another instance where the boy gets a fair trial. The 12th and 7th juror find it difficult to decide on which way to vote and therefore vote “not guilty” so that the boy is not “sent off to die.” The 12th juror’s lack of a defined and consistent point of view reflects America’s post war materialism. The 4th juror believed that the defendant was guilty for most of the play but then was the 2nd last juror to change his vote and admitted that he had a “reasonable doubt.” Although the audience never finds out whether the defendant was “guilty” or “not guilty” the jurors give the “kid from the slums” an honest trial.

Finally, Juror 8 had a huge impact on this story. Juror 8 was very insightful with his opinions and evidence. He gave himself the ability to change the minds of eleven men and save the innocent life of one. Juror 8 was the only man out of 12 who decided to look deeply into the murder case and find little pieces of evidence that everyone else seemed to miss and used that to prove his points. For example, no one would have thought about how the woman who claimed she saw the murder from across the street may have not had perfect vision. Juror 8 found little details to prove that, like how she had marks from her glasses and may not have been wearing them when she looked outside. Not even the lawyers had thought about that and most little things like that were why the young boy was almost sent to his death. Juror 8 was a true hero and stood up to his own opinion and points even when others didn’t agree with him.

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 Eight kept in his mind that he needs to have evidence and think about the evidences critically and proof to other jurors that the possibility of the defendant being guilty could be less than what they think. He did not get personal about the case and stood up by himself ignoring other ways of thinking. This shows how Juror Eight was very patient even though at the beginning of the play he was all by himself. At the end, he was successful in convincing the other jurors because he understood the background and the personality of each juror as the time passed. This quote signals Juror Eight’s determination and patience to examine all the evidence and make sure the evident character of the defendant’s murder. The honest and simply request encourages a great deal of powerful tension among the jurors, many of whom are given to conflicting views.

The murder weapon, the knife was greatly debated in the court. The exceptionality of the knife was making the boy appear to be guilty of committing the hideous crime of murdering his own father. In order to prove this juror 8 managed to purchase a similar type of knife from the boy’s neighbourhood shop showing that it was not that unique. Juror 8 tells the jury that he doesn’t want them to accept his hypothesis but it could be a possibility. Upon seeing the exactly similar knife the other jurors are told about the undependability of the prosecution and their evidence. This incident clearly shows that juror 8 just doesn’t want to prove the boy’s innocence but he wants to put a reasonable doubt about the boy’s guilt in the minds of all the other jurors.

He doesn’t believe the boy, yet believes the woman. Showing equality can’t be achieved. Then, there is a lot of information given throughout the trial that links the boy to the murder. However, when the jurors go in for deliberation, Juror Eight starts out and is the only one that says not guilty. He just wants to talk about it a little longer because this is a case that will kill the boy if he is convicted. He continuously takes out evidence and testimony including: the use of the knife; the old man’s testimony; the woman’s testimony; his whereabouts; and that the knife is one-of-a-kind (Rose 23-62). That is just a little bit of what is done. There are a lot of things here that show how there is not equality in the courtroom. The main point is that Juror Eight spent so much time investigating the facts of the case, instead of only listening to the prosecution and the defense. He went out of his way to try and prove the boy not guilty. This shows how he tried to make it two against one for the defense. He was only for getting the boy off instead of looking at both sides of the case. He deliberately went through all of the facts like a defense attorney. He thought that he needed to give the boy more help, effectively giving him two different lawyers looking at two totally different things. This shows how you can’t be equal in a courtroom, because

In a world where the jury is the voice of the people's justice, twelve men sit in a room poised to determine the fate of one boy's life. Did he do it? If he didn't, who did? Why would a young man kill his beloved father with a switchblade knife? The moment that the jury-comprised of twelve Caucasian men, abhorrent in today's society-entered the small, blank, bleak room, they had already come to the conclusion that the young man was guilty as charged without deliberation. One lone man stood his ground and had the guts to stand up to the others and profess that he believed the man could not be found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt due to conflicting information. How could he prove it?

Reaching a unanimous vote, beyond a reasonable doubt, was a difficult task for the jurors represented in the film, 12 Angry Men. All but one were convinced the boy on trial was guilty of first degree murder based on eye witness testimony and circumstantial evidence. Uncomfortably hot and sweaty, one intent on getting to a ball game, eleven of the twelve jurors had no intention to stop and think about the life contingent on their verdict. The entire story was motivated by the reasonable doubt, communication competence, and persuasion of one man. Had they not discussed the evidence in further detail and investigated potential explanations, the boy would have been executed.

Juror number one who was the high school coach with a vary laid back attitude towards the actions of the room was the first juror who I could relate to. Almost immediately you could tell that he had selective listening engaged during the first 45 minutes into the film. Willing to agree with the majority on the verdict of guilty, juror number one wasn’t going to stand out and vote not-guilty and start the feud, that will come later by juror number 8. After hearing what juror number 8 had to say about his strange vote towards not-guilty, juror number one was only paying attention to the vast majority of guilty voters who stated the obvious facts against the accused. He wasn’t about to listen to some lone random

Although the film takes place in a single room, the story succeeds in gripping the audience simply through the conversation of the jurors. The film begins with the impression that the defendant in the trial is obviously guilty. But when the jurors take a preliminary vote, there is one man, Juror #8, who votes “not guilty”. All of the jurors are frustrated with Juror #8’s decision, but they decide to talk it out. This initial conflict sets the stage for a series of intricate exchanges which bring the audience into the story. When the jurors begin to analyze the evidence from the trial, reenact the murder, and question the validity of the witnesses’ testimonies, more jurors decide to switch their vote to “not guilty”. This process of slowly revealing new information through the jury’s commentary makes for excellent storytelling and keeps viewers engaged with the film.

When Juror 4 says that “We're here to decide whether he's guilty or innocent of murder, not to go into reasons why he grew up this way. He was born in a slum. Slums are breeding grounds for criminals. I know it. So do you. It's no secret. Children from slum backgrounds are potential menaces to society. Now i think..." while the other jurors were looking different than him. It was sure that he was looking with a big prejudice and that perspective was part of his personality as we saw in the book. While the conversation goes on Juror 5 interrupts him and says that “I've lived in a slum all my life.” He also said that Juror 4 shouldn’t be that prejudiced later on. Especially when they were talking about the boys actions where the boy lives is the main evidence for the Juror 4. Also Juror 4 didn’t understand the some point. He said that “When the old man (first witness) heard the boy hoot "I'll kill you!" he assumed the boy killed his father. But sometimes people say “I’ll kill you!” , especially in fights, but that doesn’t mean that person is going to kill you. But because of Juror 4’s perception he said that the boy killed his