Essay Example - Comparative Criminal Justice at the Movies

The selected film that relates to Chapter 7 of Comparative Criminal Justice: - the Courts and Legal Professionals is the 2016 American Television series, The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story. The series is based on a true story of a criminal trial of a former gridiron football star Orenthal James Simpson (Cuba Gooding Jr.), who was exonerated in 1995 of the murder of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson (Kelly Dowdle) and her friend Ronald Goldman (Paul Witten). This criminal trial was one of the most notorious cases in the history of America.

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On the night of June 1994, the bodies of Nicole and Ron were found outside her house in Brentwood, Los Angeles, and O.J became the prime suspect of the murder (Murphy, 2016). Instead of surrendering to the police after being informed of the impending charges, Simpson attempted to escape while hiding in the back of his bronco, driven by his friend A.C Cowlings (Malcolm-Jamal Warner). He was later arrested at his home Brentwood and taken into police custody. Simpson’s trial began on January 24, 1995, with Lance Ito (Kenneth Choi) as the presiding judge (Murphy, 2016). The Los Angeles office of the district attorney, led by Marcia Clark (Sarah Paulson) and Christopher Darden (Sterling K. Brown), emphasized the domestic violence and death threats inflicted by Simpson before his divorce in 1992 as motives for murder.

The defense attorneys (the Dream Team) representing OJ included F. Lee Bailey (Nathan Lane), Johnny Cochrane (Courtney B. Vance), Robert Kardashian (David Schwimmer), Robert Shapiro (John Travolta), Shawn Chapman Holley (Angel Parker), and Alan Dershowitz (Evan Handler) with Johnny Cochrane as the lead attorney of the team (Sager, 2016). The argument of the defense attorney was mainly based on the mishandling of the evidence and racism of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), especially detective Mark Fuhrman (Steven Pasquale), who discovered the evidence. The court found Simpson not guilty of the murders of Nicole and Ron.

This film relates to the selected chapter: - the Courts and Legal Professionals because it depicts the structure, composition, and the activities of the court in a criminal justice system. This chapter explains the concepts of the court and actors in the legal profession, as portrayed in the film. The definition of a court, according to Dammer & Albanese (2013), is an agency with the power to settle disputes in society. In a court, one of the parties, the plaintiff, presents the facts of the case and explains how these facts relate to a body of law or principles that are binding in society. The other side, the defendant, dispute these facts and tries to prove that the issue before the court is outside the jurisdiction (Dammer & Albanese, 2013).

Actors within a legal profession are adjudicators, advocates, legal advisors, and legal scholars, collectively referred to as lawyers. Adjudicators decide the outcome of a legal dispute (Dammer & Albanese, 2013). They consist of judges or Jury. Advocates represent either the defendant or prosecution in a legal matter before the court. Legal advisors provide legal advice to advocates and citizens outside the court, whereas legal scholars are individuals who study law and discuss it in legal professional journals and legal commentaries (Dammer & Albanese, 2013). The Movie, American Crime Story: People v. O.J Simpson has every actor in the legal profession explained in chapter seven of the textbook. The members of the dream were advocates who represented the defendant. The LA office of the district attorney consisted of advocates who represented the prosecution. Judge Ito, together with the Jury acted as the adjudicator. Alan Dershowitz was a legal scholar and an appellate adviser for the defense attorney.

Discussion Questions

• Does evidence matter in a criminal trial considering that the defense team for OJ focused on racism and mishandling of the evidence, but not the proof itself?
• OJ was found not guilty, with the majority of the Jury being black. Was it not possible to balance the race to avoid claims that the verdict was based on racial bias?
• According to the movie, can we tell that OJ was indeed guilty of the murder of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman?

References

Dammer, H. R., & Albanese, J. S. (2013). Comparative criminal justice systems. Boston: Cengage Learning.

Murphy, R. (Director). (2016). The People v. O. J. Simpson: American Crime Story [Motion Picture]. https://www.netflix.com/title/80083977

Sager, J. (2016, February 2). Page Six. Retrieved June 5, 2020, from https://pagesix.com/2016/02/02/the-real-faces-behind-american-crime-story-the-people-v-o-j-simpson/#3