Surroundings Matter

For my Law and Society Paper, I wrote about Evan Miller. At 14, Miller was convicted of first degree murder, arson and robbery charges. I spent a lot of time trying to understand the decisions of the Supreme Court, but I am more interested by the crime itself and what led Miller to live a violent lifestyle in the first place. Miller was only 14, which meant that he was still experiencing cognitive development. During developmental years, humans easily become influenced by the things happening around them, which is why things like peer pressure and societal norms are known to greatly impact teens especially.

I am a firm believer that children are products of their surroundings. If a child is shown hate and violence than most of the time that child will grow up to reflect that in their actions and how they treat others. Somewhere in Miller's past he was shown that violence and stealing are acceptable behaviors if they get you what you want, whether that be power, revenge or someone's personal items.

Although important, it seems that not every parent is able to comprehend the idea that their behavior heavily influences their child's upbringing. Do you guys think that this is a problem that can be fixed?

Details

While listening to the different testimonies, I found it interesting how different the testimonies were.  While some people said that Brown had his hands slightly raised to his shoulders, others said that his hands were at his sides.  Some said that he ran towards Wilson, while others said he walked slowly.   Another controversial topic is that car behind Wilson's vehicle.  Was it a white Monte Carlo or a darker color Monte Carlo?  When recalling something that happens, I think that an event, like a shooting, makes peoples' memories about what happened harder to remember.  When someone thinks about a traumatic event too much the details can get mixed up.  This is not true for all the people who testify, but I think it happens to some.

NAUGHTY teacher that Pamela Smart was

Pamela Smart is one crazy teacher like you as a teacher should not hook up with any of you're students like not when they are in school. You are suppose to be a role model to these kids in a way. She wanted to leave her husband so bad but not lose everything they had because if she left him they would have to split everything.She couldn't wait to leave him so she took some students virginity made him fall in-love with her , teenager being in love with the sex make them do some crazy stuff like kill someones husband. She is indeed guilty for being a little snake.

Donald Trump: If you aren't sexist, stop saying sexist things.

I am pretty vocal in class about my distaste for our new president-elect. Living in the liberal Silicon Valley, it is really easy to ask ourselves how this possibly could have happened, and who is responsible for putting this big ball of earwax in the most important of executive positions. I have done my research on the demographics of the majority of Trump and Clinton voters. Not surprisingly, the overwhelming majority of trump supporters were of Caucasian race. (Pew Research). Of course it is unfair to claim that every Trump supporter is a white racist who doesn't believe in global warming and hates POC. Regardless, I don't see how someone could claim that they stand for equality and respect and then vote an astonishingly problematic and bigoted elect for president. Here is a short list of problematic/misogynistic things Trump has said:

1) His remarks about Megyn Kelly
2) His remarks about Hillary Clinton
3) Calling women unattractive and fat pigs
4) Telling women that they would not have their jobs if they weren't "beautiful"
5) Saying he would date his daughter?? grOSS
6) Mocking a disabled reporter
7) His remarks about Arianna Huffington
8) His remarks about Rosie O'Donnell
9) "It must have been a pretty picture, you dropping to your knees" ha. ha ha. help
10) saying that pregnancy is an inconvenience to a business

Keep in mind that this is ONLY capturing a few of the SEXIST things Trump has said. He has made numerous xenophobic, racist, homophobic, transphobic, and classist remarks as well, but if I were to write even half of those down I would be here all day.
When someone continually says bigoted things, it is ridiculous to say that they are a good leader. You are your words. If your words are continually hurtful and mean, you will be considered a mean person.

Donald Trump Warning: Side Effects Include Racist Backlash

A few weeks have passed since the election and people refuse to settle down. Since Donald Trump's transformation from a mocked character on SNL to the elected President, the news has been painted with protests, hatred, and racism. It's easy to sit in front of the TV or scroll through your phone and see the horrible things that certain Trump supporters are doing, like spray painting swastikas or sending hate mail to mosques. But as with most things, you have to see it to believe it. After only 3 days of using social media as my source of information regarding the hatred racists have been spreading, I got a glimpse of it first hand. My mom was in the elevator of my grandparents apartment complex, talking on the phone to my aunt in Farsi. A middle aged, Caucasian woman stepped into the elevator and told her to speak English because "this is America". When my mom told her to mind her own business, the woman continued to tell her to stop speaking whatever "Asian language" she was talking in until reaching her floor. My mom has lived in this country for over 30 years, and hasn't been a target of racism since she was living in Texas during the Iran hostage crisis. I've never felt such anger at someone that I don't even know, but the fact that the felt that it was her place to tell someone else how to live in this country that was founded and built by immigrants just bewilders me. It is not a coincidence that there has been a trend of rising racist actions through the country in the past few weeks. Whether or not Trump is going to build a wall or do any of the other racist things he claimed, he has been successful in justifying racism. He has appealed to the racist minds of people who have been told that it is socially unacceptable to discriminate against others or tell people to speak English, and has made them believe that this behavior is acceptable. People feel like if the President can say it, so can they. I have seen it for myself, and I know that having a bigot in office means that we should be expecting a lot more racist behavior in the near future.

No Footage of Brown Shooting?

I just wanted to take a second and look at something strange I noticed about the shooting of Michael Brown. Almost every witness, or at least a large number of them, reported that they stopped looking at the shooting for a moment so they could get out their phones and record. But where are those recordings??? Maybe I missed something but even on youtube I cannot find a single video of the shooting itself. It's not like this was 2003 and phones were slow and not all of them had cameras, this shooting took place in 2014, when everyone more or less has a camera on their phone with the touch of a button. Lately, people record everything they see. School fights are recorded, police brutality is recorded, even kids flipping water bottles are recorded but somehow everyone missed this? If at least ten people said they were getting their phone out to record, and the entire interaction lasted a couple minutes, we can assume that maybe some people didn't get to their phone cameras in time, and that some didn't have their phone charged, and some video might be so blurry that it is useless, but really nobody was able to get at least a couple seconds of footage? In this age of information, it is almost your civic duty as a citizen of the United States with access to a device that can record film to record any violence or potential wrongdoing because, as we have seen during this trial, eye witness testimony is unreliable.

Stand YOU're ground

That case had me thinking a lot, the reason for that is that I can totally relate to this. This made me think what if me and my friends that look a bit more "hood" "ghetto" than what most actually know. Are at parking lot  somewhere bumming music super loud and someone tries to stand there ground like that. Like us as teenager we think we can do a lot without any cost. Me and my friends could easily be taken as kids from somewhere else, when we actually live in Mountain View/Los altos area which is a great area. We don't live in EPA or east side San Jose someone could easily take us as that for the color of our skin or how we dress or the music we bum. The attitude we give off, no one should be killed for just bumming music.

Human Behavior experiments

Three of the main behavior experiments that we looked at were the Stanford Prison experiment, the Milgram experiment, and the Line experiment.
The Stanford Prison experiment looked at how people change when they are given unrestricted power. In the study volunteers were chosen at random to play prison guards and prisoners. The first day of the experiment was a very awkward time because none of the guards felt comfortable bossing the prisoners around. After one guard decided to start being harsh with the prisoners the rest of the guards followed his lead. When this first started the prisoners would push back against the authority. However the guards kept ramping up their punishment to the point where the prisoners barricaded themselves into their cells. The guards would continue to ramp up the punishment by making the prisoners do very embarrassing things. The guards did not stop because the people in charge of the experiment never told them to dial it back. The experiment was eventually shut down after 6 days, because Zimbardo, the main psychologist behind the experiment, realized that it had gotten out of control. The experiment had gotten to the point were some of the prisoners were having mental breakdowns. This experiment shows us that when people are given unrestricted power they will abuse it.
The Milgram experiment was designed to see if people would follow orders from an authority figure even if they didn't agree with the orders. The study was done to try and figure out why the Nazis followed some of Hitlers orders. The layout of the study was they a subject was told to ask a person a set of questions, and if the person got the question wrong then they were to be shocked in increasing voltage for each wrong answer. What the person did not know what the person they were interviewing was a tape recording. As the shocks got to higher voltages the recording would beg the subject to stop, while the authority figure next to the subject would tell him to carry on with the experiment. The experiment showed that roughly 2/3 of all people would go to the top of the shock board. This was true for almost all groups of people that were tested. This experiment shows us that people will go against what they believe if an authority figure tells them to do it.
Last but not least is the Line experiment. This study was all about conformity. There was a room filled with people who were "in" on the experiment and one person who was the test subject, however they did not know the room was filled with other people who knew what the experiment was. The group was shown a line and then three other lines and asked to tell which line (a, b or c) was the most similar in length to the first line they were shown. The group that was "in" on the experiment would randomly choose the wrong line to see if the subject would conform to the group. The study showed that about 37% of the time the person would conform to the group even though they knew the answer was wrong. However when one other person also goes against the group the subject was much less likely to conform to the group. This shows that people are likely to conform to be a part of a group so that they do not stand out, but if one other person is willing to go against the group as well they you are much less likely to go with the group. That is when you do not agree with the group opinion or view.

After hearing different witness testimonies including that of Officer Wilson. When hearing Officer Wilson's testimony, it was clear that he felt extremely threatened and feared for his life. He said was hit in the face. Looking at the pictures taken of him at the hospital I had a hard time even seeing them.
Other witnesses at the scene also gave their testimonies as well. In those Brown had his hands up , hands down, hands  reaching toward where he was just shot. His friend was hiding behind a blue or white Monte Carlo. It is hard to understand what is true and trustworthy when the color of the Monte Carlo kept changing colors.
Even with that, I still feel like Michael Brown was not a real threat after the second round of shots even if he was still moving. A medical examiner said that if he did not receive that bullet to the brain he still would have died from his other wounds. I don't think that Brown would have been able to kill Officer Wilson with fatal injuries. I feel like the final round of shots including the one to his head was unnecessary. It does not mean that I do not think Officer Wilson felt threatened.
In the end, an18 year old did die.

Convicts When They Get Out

Do you really know what happens to ex con when they get out of prison, are they treated fairly, do they even have a life to go back to when they get out? Ex cons yes they made some horrible choices in the past but I think their needs to be a change in helping them getting back on their feet when they finished their time. I have many family members that have gone to prison and came out and they really don't know how to live in the life they live in now. I know someone that a couple of months ago got out of prison for a 30 year sentence, and when he finally got out a couldn't believe the changes. When he got out he thought the world would kinda be the same it was when he got into prison, oh man he wrong. He started to realize that as days and weeks went past, it was very hard for him to live, most of his family didn't wanna help him because he was a criminal, the government didn't give him money to get back on his feet. He was homeless for about 3 months and couldn't find a job because no one would hire him because of his record. I think this is a little harsh, yes they did bad things but that doesn't mean they shouldn't even have a life. Ex cons have it really bad, and people wonder why criminals actually have a high suicide rate when they get out, it is because their life is so hard they can't even afford food and a place to sleep. So what do they result in if no one can help, they go back to breaking the law because thats sometimes the only thing that they know like stealing and selling drugs and what happens eventually they get caught and they are right back where it all began. They are trapped in a cell in prison, and when they get out they are stuck in a cell as well.

Review on OJ Simpson Case

Known as the most infamous case possibly of the century, the OJ Simpson case is plagued with controversy. In my opinion OJ was guilty due to the many pieces of evidences against him and his unusual reaction and actions taken after the murder of Nicole and Ron. The DNA evidence in itself was enough to convict OJ, furthermore the same DNA was found in his car and at the scene of the crime. Also, when reviewing the defense and its claims that the evidence was planted, it is clear that the police could have not planned to falsely charge OJ for the murder of his ex wife and Ron Goldman. Because of this it is remarkable how the defense team was able to defend a seemingly "impossible" case by switching the topic, in this case the way the police handled the evidence, which helped create enough doubt in the jury. I think that because of this, the most important lesson we can learn from the OJ Simpson case is the need for a strong prosecution/defense because otherwise a clear case becomes a matter of rolling a die in which one has to hope the jury correctly interprets both sides of a case. This becomes even more important when one realizes the impact of such a result for a case, not only for someone like OJ or the parents of Ron Goldman, but how it can impact the entire country due to the high amount of publicity.

Case studies pt.1

We started the case studies off by looking at the Von Bulow case.  In this case Von Bulow's wife Sunny had fallen into a coma. In fact it was her second coma, almost as if it had been induced. Claus Von Bulow's step kids accused him of injecting their mother with insulin. Claus denied this claim, however the step kids found a black bag in his closet that contained an insulin needle. Even though this was very concrete evidence, in my opinion, to show that he had tried to kill Sunny, Claus's defense attorneys argued that the black bag was not credible evidence because the kids took the bag to the family doctor instead of straight to the police. This would have given them time to plant evidence inside of the bag. Claus also stood to gain from his wife's death because he would inherit her large fortune.  However he was indicted by a grand jury on two counts of attempted murder. However two years after the trial his ruling was overturned and he settled with the kids to never talk about the incident in public again, and Bulow renounced all claims to the money. However the daughter he had with sunny still received her inheritance.
The second case that we looked at was the "dog" case. Two very very large dogs got out of their apartment and mauled a women to death. However the case ended up being about the owner. The owners, the Knoller's, were being charged with second degree murder. There was an argument made that the dogs were weapons because they had shown signs of aggression before. People in the apartment complex came forward with stories all of which portrayed the dogs as a menace. She was eventually sentenced to 15 years in state prison for second degree murder.
Then came the Andrea Yates case. This one was a little disturbing in my opinion. Andrea Yates was a mother of 5 kids. Prior to killing her kids she had been in and out of a psychiatric hospital because of depression and psychosis. Yates claimed that she had been hearing voices, specifically the voice of satan. Supposedly Satan was telling her to kill because she had failed as a mother. Before taking her children's lives she attempted to commit suicide. She also claimed that the only reason she killed her kids was because they had to die while they were still young and innocent in order to get into heaven. When going through court she pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. She was found guilty of first degree murder and currently resides in a mental institution, where she will stay the rest of her life.

The real person at fault

After hearing others views and reading my transcript on the Ferguson case I believe Wilson was guilty. He used extensive force which ended up with a young life lost. I believe that the first shot fired was reasonable because Michael Brown was inside of Wilson's car trying to grab ahold of Wilson's gun. Wilson felt Michael's finger on the trigger and the gun had two blank fires due to Michaels hand on top of the gun. I believe that Wilson had every right to fire because he was threatened and if Michael got a hold of the gun it would have ended differently. When Michael started to run towards the light pole after the first shot Wilson still had the right to shoot I believe. When I think Wilson went wrong was when Michael turned towards Wilson with his hands up and Wilson still fired at him. Michael was surrendering. I think Wilson had not right to kill Michael. Michael knew he messed up by running away and was surrendering to Wilson but Wilson did not see it as surrendering. Michael was already shot in the stomach and was already in pain. Then Wilson took the last shot and it hit Michael through the top of the head because he was already falling down to his knees. I believe Wilson should have been charged with involuntary manslaughter

Who is really at fault?

After hearing the presentations and ready my transcript there are so many different stories its hard to conclude what really happened. However I do believe that Officer Wilson abused his power and shot way too many times. Because of Mikes size I understand why Wilson felt threatened but this whole could have been avoided if Wilson had not reversed back to Mike and provoked him. After the fight in the car the first shot was justified to get mike to back off. However, when mike started to turn around after running Wilson should have stopped shooting because there have been a lot of consistent stories where mike was not a threat. With that said hearing all these different sides reminds me of what is happening today. We have a country divided between the thought that either police officers are good or bad, and all black brutality that happens either should not have or the person had it coming. Unless we can find a middle ground and show that even though some force is needed that not all blacks are threats and we should not single them out based on the color of their skin.

The Presence of Police Officers in Minority Neighborhoods

The main reason why the justice system and police officers exist is to simply serve and protect the citizens of any given community. One would easily notice how rare it is to see police officers patrolling well-to-do and safe neighborhoods/towns such as Los Altos. At the same time many people like to note how minority neighborhoods often are swarming with police officers. Safe to say, there is a reason for this and a reason which very well makes sense. The presence of police officers is often a necessity in these neighborhoods which is very proportionate to the amount of crime/victimization that goes on.

According to the Washington Post, police officers are often deployed to areas where people are being victimized the most which in many cases tends to be minority neighborhoods. Taking blacks for example, in a trend that is repeated in virtually all American metropolises, blacks often make up a small number of people living in the city (New York City has a 23% blacks) yet make up the majority of the crimes being committed in these cities (Blacks commit 75% of all shootings and 70% of all robberies in New York City). 

Being a nationwide trend yet being backed up by facts, statistics, and common sense, it would be clear to a sensible person that the heavy presence of police officers in certain communities has to deal with protecting and serving potential victims of these communities and not simply racial bias. 

Charges against Darren Wilson

From what I have read so far I feel that Wilson should been charged with voluntary manslaughter.  The presentations have showed me that both sides were in the wrong but in the end, the person who ended up losing his life was Mike brown and Wilson should have faced repercussions. Some factors to mention that I thought was interesting was that Wilson dad was a police officer too and he was killed by a black suspect. Wilson had already harbored resentment, and when the incident occurred he acted on him emotions and ended up killing Mike. Voluntary Man slaughter is  when you kill someone in the heat of passion, but had no prior intent to kill. Wilson was a cop, and was aware of how deadly the force he was using, so I think voluntary manslaughter is a fair charge to persecute Wilson with.

The Tragedy of Assumptions

More often than not, there will be a mainstream story floating around based on a police shooting that involves the stereotypical story of a white police officer shooting an "unarmed" black male. Yes, it is indeed true that there are some genuine cases where an officer unjustly killed a person (regardless of race), yet the majority of the stories being drummed up by the Mainstream Media miss out on a few points.

First off; the main narrative that almost always gets brought up by the main news networks is race. It is almost common place to hear the words "white police officer", "black male shot", and "racism" be thrown around whether it's simply there to emphasize certain details of the story or create contempt in the general public against whites or police officers. But the important thing to note is that the majority of police shootings don't even involve black people. According to the Washington Post, as of July 9th, 2016 counting for the year up to that point, there were approximately 440 police shootings in which the race of the person shot was known. Out of these 440 people, 54% were white whereas only 26% of the people shot were black. However, there also comes another question in which people have a hard time understanding (and understandably so), "blacks represent only 13% of the U.S. population and 26% of police shootings, isn't this disproportionate?"

To easily word it, no this isn't disproportionate in the least. It is worthy to note that in many of these cases where the police officer had to shoot an unarmed person, the person had made a threatening move towards the police officer and in many actual cases where the person wasn't unarmed, they had also threatened or brandished their weapon in front of the officer. On the other hand many people may wonder why had the police officer been chasing or holding the suspect in custody (and blacks in a seemingly disproportionate rate), but it is worthy to note according to the Washington Post that in America's 75 largest counties that comprised most of the countries' population in 2009, blacks constituted 62% of all robbery defendants, 57% of all murder defendants, and 45% of all assault defendants. According to the same source in New York City alone, blacks only make up 23% of the city's population yet commit over 75% of all shootings and 70% of all robberies. Compare this to whites who commit less than 2% of all shootings and 4% of all robberies yet they comprise 34% of the city's population.

In conclusion, the United States does not harbor a justice system that innately single out blacks and shoot them unjustly but rather it tends to be according to facts and statistics that blacks are the main perpetrator in many of these police shooting cases and are so heavily involved with getting in trouble with police officers and landing themselves in the situation to be shot as they commit an disproportionately high percentage of crime compared to their low percentage of the total population. Whatever you decide to take away from this, it is wise to not rush to assumptions that white-on-black police shootings automatically indicate racism or a problem with our justice system but rather a need for change and reform in the black community itself.

Importance of precise police work

During both the OJ Simpson case and the Michael Brown incident, handling of the evidence by the police played a key role in both cases. Due to mishandling of some of the key items such as the gloves that were found at the scene as well as the blood found at Nicole's house and in the Bronco, handling of evidence became a vital role for Simpson's defense. Whereas it played a more significant role in Simpson's case, where the mishandling of evidence allowed him to win the trial, any such wrong use of evidence can be detrimental to the police. In the Michael Brown case, the detectives and police didn't correctly number the evidence that they found with the lab results which depending on the jury can lead to potential exclusion of certain evidence. With evidence lost a case can dramatically change as well as the prosecution can no longer prove that an individual truly is guilty. Ultimately, it is not only the evidence that is important for the prosecution but the way that it is collected and handled in order to increase the chances of winning a trial; often the significance of this is forgotten until an outrageous case such as OJ Simpson's occurs.

Ferguson Presentations

After listening to the presentations so far, it seems as thought both parties involved were at fault. Before doing this project, I didn't know a whole lot about the details of the Brown shooting. After reading my Grand Jury Volume #14, I was convinced that Darren Wilson was at fault. From both of my witnesses, Brown did nothing wrong besides being a big guy. He never put his hands in the window, he never touched Wilson, nor did he really threaten Wilson. But, after watching the other presentations and listening to other witnesses, it seems like both Wilson and Brown are at fault. Because Brown had fought back at Wilson, he was definitely a threat. The way that Wilson handled the situation, shooting him nearly 10 times, was not the right way to handle the situation though. A police officer should be trained to handle a man such as Brown in a way that doesn't make him the dead boy on the ground. It was interesting to hear the witnesses say that there was a "tug of war" going on between the men. This shows that both men were fighting against each other, making both of them technically at fault. So far in this case, I do think that the Jury has gotten their verdict correct, but I do also think that Darren should be charged with something, whether it be related to his overuse of the weapon or the way he went about the situation.

State of Missouri V. Darren Wilson so far

We have seen 6 presentations so far in case of State of Missouri V. Darren Wilson. So far we have heard many different pieces of testimony. In the first presentation that Mrs. B gave we learned who the prosecutors are and got the intro to the case. This included how the grand jury worked who each prosecutor was and how the investigation to this case was carried out. The first testimony that we heard was from the medical examiner. His job was to take photos of the Mike Browns body and nothing else. Although the medical examiner forgot his camera and had one of police officers at the crime scene take the pictures for him. Specifically the Crime scene detective was asked to take pictures of the body as well as pictures of the crime scene. We learned this in the second presentation. The crime scene detective gets to decide what pictures he wants to take. This combined with the fact that the medical examiner "forgot" his camera made the jury wonder if something suspicious was going on with this investigation. The third presentation that we heard talked a lot about the wounds that Michael Brown received during the confrontation with Officer Wilson. The conclusion that the presenters came to was that there was enough evidence for this case to go to a trail because there were a lot of unknowns. There were a lot of unknowns in Volume three because the testimony did not talk about how Brown received the injuries it just stated what the injuries were and what they would have done to him. In the next volume, volume four we hear from Mike Browns friend Dorian. Dorian was walking home with Mike Brown when they were confronted by Officer Wilson. Dorian said that he watched both Michael Brown and Wilson struggle by the car while Officer Wilson tried to grab his gun. He said that he left the scene once he heard the first gun shot. The first gun shot was fired while Darren Wilson was still in his car. The fifth presentation that we heard had four different testimonies in it, including one by Darren Wilson himself. The other three testimonies were all from people who had interviewed Darren Wilson. None of the interviews that were talked about in this volume were recorded, instead all of the testimony was given from what they remembered of the interview. Although each story was a little different they all had the same underlying story. They all said that when interviewing Officer Wilson he said something along the lines of, he felt threatened, scared, and thought he saw a psychotic look in Mike Browns eyes. The sixth presentation that we heard was actually the seventh volume. During the seventh volume we heard from multiple eye witnesses that all saw different parts of the encounter between Mike Brown and Darren Wilson. Through all of the witnesses they told the same story we have already heard. There was a struggle for Wilson's gun, a shot was fired, Brown took off running while Wilson was shooting at him and then Brown Turned around and charged back toward Officer Wilson. The only detail that varied from this story in one of the witnesses testimony was that they said Brown did not look aggressive and that he walked slowly toward Wilson.

Recently we began our in depth look over the Ferguson shooting, looking into the testimonies, the evidence, and the case itself. While reading through my transcripts, one of my witnesses briefly touches a very interesting point I think the Grand Jury should have further looked into. He tells the Grand Jury at the end of his testimony, that while growing up in Ferguson, he also grew up with the harassment. He tells the Grand Jury that the day Mike Brown died, it was just an average day; people out and about and walking their dogs. It was not a day for anything like that to have gone down. What my witness is saying is that, the shooting of Mike Brown was something that's been happening for a long time. Black kids being treated guilty until proven innocent. The shooting of Micheal Brown is a tragedy, but its a tragedy this whole community has been very familiar with.

Police and Guns

Why do police officers carry guns?  The obvious answer to most people is to protect themselves and others from dangerous people they encounter while on the job.  But is the purpose of the gun to kill a person or just injure them?  So why did Officer Wilson shoot Michael Brown?  Was he threatened by Brown's actions or was there another reason.  I read an article on Huffington Post, that in the UK, New Zeland, and a few other countries, the police are unarmed.  The crime rates in the UK are half of the crime rates in the US, does this really prove anything?  This article has more information on armed police: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-koehler/should-the-police-be-arme_b_7083444.html

Medical Examiner

At the moment,  I can't make any decisions about the conclusions of this case.  While reviewing the medical examiner's, I found it funny that their camera did not work and the police had to take the photos for him.  Even though it is possible that this is a coincidence, it is just weird that it happened during this case.  I think that he said this has happened before so why doesn't he bring another camera or battery with him? The medical examiner also got the call at around 1:30 and he didn't start until 3:30.  He said that it took a while for the other to set up the scene, but that's a really big gap of time.  Also, wouldn't it be good to have 2 people doing the medical examiner's job, so there are 2 people taking photos and looking through/examining to make sure that everything is protocol?

America ISN'T so great anymore

Donald Trump the Fool,crazy, just a rich guy getting his ways and OUR NEW president. Crazy to see that this bum really won. I mean us living in California especially in Los altos/Palo alto/ Mountain View area we see the both sides of it. We can drive up these beautiful hills and see all the different types of people that pretty much made it for them or family what ever reason ,BUT we see color also is the fact.Also we can drive a little down to EAST PALO ALTO were people actually struggle. We as adults and kids that live in California have a better sense of how America really is. We see color, struggle like even in school. You see all white kids hanging out in the quad but if you walk to the back all you see is color people, OUTSIDERS. FDT.

Grand Jury Finding

I find it hard to believe that the Grand Jury found that there was not enough evidence for a trial in the State of Missouri v. Darren Wilson case. Even after only reading my own section I felt that there were a lot of unanswered questions, but then when I listened to the other 3 presentations in class I realized that there are a lot of questionable things going on in this case. It doesn't make sense to me that Darren Wilson would be so aggressive towards someone who was just walking in the street, let alone shoot them 6 or more times. Even the nature of the shots should be enough evidence for a trial, Michael Brown suffered 3 fatal shots, aside from the rest, after putting his hands up to show he was unarmed. Officer Wilson's reaction to this situation was clearly out of line, causing the death of a young boy. Whether it is racism or something else, there is clearly something else going on here that has yet to be revealed. I realize that there are a lot of more volumes to go over so perhaps these questions will get answered later, but at this point I just don't understand why this wouldn't go on trial.

Trump elected

It was very disappointing viewing the election because it just opened our eyes to see how different we here in the Bay Area are. We come from a diverse community where we accept all types of people no matter their race, gender, or anything else. But after looking at how many people voted for Trump, it showed the true colors of America and the fact that we still have a long way to go in terms of ending racism and accepting everyone for who they are. I'm not saying everyone who voted for Trump is a racist, but that doesn't change the fact that they voted for someone who is a bigot and shares ideals that will set us back from where we are right now. I don't really know what to expect from him as president but I just hope he realizes what he said he would do will make America worse.

State of Missouri vs. Darren Wilson

From what I have heard so far from the Grand Jury presentations, it is clear no decisions can be made at this point. There has not been any testimonies  that have caused me to believe that the officers/ detectives who have given statements had not done anything to compromise the crime scene. The procedures seemed to be standard and followed protocol. The only thing that stood out to me as a little odd was that the pictures were not taken by the Medical Examiner like they were supposed to be. He did mention on several occasions that it was because his camera battery was dead. It seems strange that he would not have charged his camera battery given that it is a large part of his job to take picture at the scene. Mistakes do happen, but it just comes off as weird. Besides that, the crime scene detectives seemed to not have done anything out of the ordinary and nothing from those testimonies stood out to me. I have not formed an opinion yet on the case as a whole but this is what I took from first few volumes.

2016 Election

A little late but, the 2016 presidential election was an unprecedented event due to many factors. The Democratic Party candidate, Hillary Clinton and the Republican Party candidate, Donald Trump were the most hated presidential candidates in history. With around half of the population heavily disliking both candidates before they even become the president raises concern for the American people. Secondly, almost every single news outlet and statistical projection including FiveThirtyEight.com predicted Hillary Clinton would win with odds being at around 70-80%. The statisticians did not account for what is being called the “silent majority”, the group of people who didn’t openly admit they were in support of trump due to fear of persecution. Just like that Donald Trump won and no one saw it coming.

Grand Jury Volumes

While reading the testimony transcripts, I found it very interesting how different people act toward the police and FBI.  It seems that both of the witnesses I read about were hesitant and careful while talking to the officers.  One of the witnesses said, "I don't know if they was playing bad cop, good cop stuff" while stating her testimony. Both of the witnesses lied in their first testimony and ended up having to give another one later on.  Which is why I found it interesting when I discovered that the same two cops took the testimony for both of them.  While taking the testimony, the body language and actions of both of the cops were on opposite sides of the spectrum.  One kept calling the witnesses a liar while he was taking their testimony while the other just stood by watching, occasionally telling the his partner to tone it down.  I think the way someone talks and acts has the power to tell you a lot about their character and many other things.

I just dont know what to believe

This is my first post and we haven't really been talking about this in class, and I am not sure if we are allowed to just talk about whatever on here but I just wanted to say that I am confused by a lot of things in the world. There are a lot of social issues out there that, perhaps because I live in the enlightened (and some what isolated) world of silicon valley, or because of the way I was raised, that I just don't know what to think about. For instance, illegal immigration, on the one hand, I am told it provides America with cheap labor and a strong workforce for the jobs that most Americans just don't want to do. On the other hand though, while they do pay sales tax on purchases, they don't have to pay income or property tax, while receiving the benefits of public education and healthcare. I don't know what my stance is on immigration because I don't know who to believe. I also don't know if I even believe in the gender wage gap. I have done research on both sides of this and on the one side I hear that resonating cry that "women get paid 77% of what men make, and minorities make even less", and that is terrible don't get me wrong. On the other hand though, I hear (what I feel like are) logical arguments saying that this statistic represents women in the workforce as a whole as opposed to men and women working in the same job for the same amount of time, meaning that the wage gap comes simply from men and women making different decisions in terms of occupation. I also hear arguments that, if companies could get away with paying women less, why would they hire men. These are only two examples of social issues that I really just have not made up my mind about. Something I have observed, however, is that although I am told the wage gap exists, and illegal immigration is bad (or good depending on who you talk to), these things are really just beliefs. Until you make your own study, or watch every step of a study done by someone else, there is know way of knowing if your beliefs have any basis in reality or if they were simply imagined by someone, or someone conducted a biased test and the results are skewed. In fact, although I believe in climate change, I have only been on this earth eighteen years and I have not felt the it getting any hotter. I believe the scientists, and the economists or the politicians when they say this is true or that is true, but I don't know anything for sure. I just don't know what to believe.

Despite the blood found at his residence, his shoe prints at the crime scene, and his suspicious alibi, people, including myself, still had trouble accepting the fact that OJ Simpson killed Nicole Brown and Ron Goldman. If it were anyone else, the evidence presented would have had them locked up without a doubt. However, the media portrayal of OJ Simpson throughout his life made it seemingly impossible for him to have committed such a crime. His image was one of a great athlete, but also someone who was kind and lighthearted. He was intelligent and throughout his career he manipulated his image to make it what it was, by doing things like inviting the whole team to the interview after winning a game and giving everyone a shout out. But when you really look at it, he did nice things like these to boost his image even more because it made him look even better. I think that the public thought they knew OJ Simpson from seeing his interviews and seeing him on TV, but they only knew the side of him that he wanted them to see. This is why when he was convicted of murder, they couldn't believe that the nice guy they thought they knew could have done it. This same idea applies to all celebrities, as soon as someone does something that doesn't match their public image, everyone is in shock. The reality is, no matter how a celebrity portrays themselves, they're still real people who have the capability of making mistakes and even committing horrible crimes.

The Juice Guilty or Innocent?

        As we all know we recently studied the case of OJ Simpson, we weren't able to see the two sides of the coin, Simpson didn't get the chance to say what he thought and how he felt, he always wanted to avoid the topic. Do you think that if he was to talk about this case more, it would look better or worse for himself? Most of the evidence had someway to get away from him, the glove was too small, the sock and other blood were not found until after a long time, blood was missing from the sample he provided, and the cut in his hand cause by a glass he broke. Was The Juice innocent or did he just know how to play the game? We also know that white people loved OJ even though he was black, because all the publicity said that he was okay, acceptable, so if the defense attorney would've gotten a different jury then it would have had been different, the actual jury was composed of mostly minority, and women that were abused, but if they would have gotten more white people in the jury despite the fact that he was preached by them automatically the cards would've turned on him, he would've been seen differently.

Michael Brown

In the testimony transcripts, I read about how Dorian Johnson was the main witness in the shooting of Michael Brown because he was the one that was with him at the moment and he saw everything that happened since he was with him the whole time from 7 am until he died which was until 12 pm. Dorian also got shot but after the officer had killed Michael, Dorian wasn't being looked for. People were saying that Dorian was already dead but nobody really knew who it was that was with Michael. It was interesting how Dorian Johnson said that he saw no reason for the officer to have killed Michael. From what I have read, I also believe that there was no reason at all for the officer to kill Michael because while he was running, the officer didn't tell him to stop or halt or anything he just started shooting.

Where Is The Love Tho?

The Black Eyed Peas re-released one of their most influential songs, "Where is the Love". When the song first released in 2003, it was mostly just made for the album even though it had a very strong message, but when it was re-released in 2016, it was to protest the killings of unarmed black individuals

Simpson Trial

After watching the criminal trial, I came to the conclusion that Simpson was guilty with reasonable doubt.  But after the civil trial, I wasn't quite sure if he was guilty or not.  Throughout both cases, I started to believe that the evidence had been tampered with and people had been lying about certain details.  There was a blood trail between the two houses and through DNA tests, it tested to be Simpson's blood.  But the blood could have been placed by police officers, who were trying to set up Simpson because it was found weeks later after the crime happened.  When they took Simpson's blood test, the officer drove around with the sample for a few hours before checking it into the lab with 6mL in the tube.  The person who gave Simpson the blood test originally said that he took 8 mL of his blood but later said it was actually 6 mL that he took.  Officer Furman, had a reputation for disliking minority races, was the first person on the crime scene, who could have placed the glove at Simpson's and helped frame him for the crime.  There are a lot of factors that can add up to make us believe that he was not guilty of the crime and framed by the police.  On the other hand, OJ Simpson said that he never owned a pair of Bruno Magli shoes.  When he was shown a photo of him at the football game with the shoes on, he said it was photoshopped and when shown 30+ more photos of him wearing them, he declared they were photoshopped as well.  Only around 300 pairs of this type of shoe was made and on the scene of the crime, there were footprints left by size 12 Bruno Magli shoes.  There is no way that all the photos were photoshopped, so he had to be lying in some way.  In the end, if some of the evidence in the civil trial was shown in the criminal trial and some of the evidence in the criminal trial was left out, the outcome would have been different.  I believe that both the sentences the juries made were reasonable.

OJ Guilty

After viewing multiple videos and documentaries about OJ, I would say he is guilty of the murder. There is so much evidence they have that proves he is culpable for the crime. The DNA tests all have his blood in every sample they took which points at him as the murderer. Then he has the fancy shoes that were at the crimes scene, although he claims never to have bought them. This is a lie because there were over thirty photos of him wearing these shoes in different places. Then we see that he has a history of domestic violence with his wife and pictures of her with bruises. It is obvious all of these incidents and emotions all led to the murder of Nicole. Then we saw him driving away from the cops in the white truck. Who would run away from the cops if they were innocent? It just doesn't make sense if he were innocent to be doing things like that. Then the gloves that were found with blood matched the blood of OJ. The reason they didn't fit is because leather tends to shrink after is has been wet, which is why they didn't fit OJ in the trial. Finally, he is guilty because he had the cut on his finger that he says has no idea how he got it. How do you not know when you get a cut that big on your finger. You can't bleed everywhere in your house from one cut on the finger. All his stories don't add up and the evidence is there to prove him guilty.

OJ Simpson, Guilty or Not?

For the past couple of weeks we have been taking an in depth look at the OJ Simpson case. As Mr. Stewart has put it many of times, the Simpson case has a mixture of everything. There is a trail in the criminal courts in which Mr. Simpson is found not guilty of double murder in the 1st degree. There is also a civil court case in which OJ is found guilty and had to pay out a total of $33 Million to the families of Ron Goldman and Nicole Brown Simpson.
I found it interesting that in the criminal case the jury was predominantly black and very quickly found OJ not guilty, and in the civil case the jury was predominantly white and found OJ guilty almost as quickly as the black jury found him not guilty.
Personally I would have to side with jury from the criminal case. I think that although there is enough evidence to convict OJ, a large majority of the evidence seems to be tampered with. Too me this causes enough reasonable suspicion of the police that I could not find OJ Simpson guilty. Even though we have been looking at this case for almost two weeks and seen many, many hours of documentaries on this case I still can not decide whether or not OJ Simpson killed his ex-wife and her friend.
Even though the blood and DNA evidence shows that OJ was at the crime scene and had a blood trail all the way back to my house, part of me still thinks that the police may have framed him. The fact that the police did not find a lot of the blood till weeks later, there was a spill in the lab, and one of the detectives was driving around with a vial of OJ's blood that mysteriously lost about a mL of the blood. When all of these factors are added up the data looks a little to suspicious for me to think that OJ is guilty. The other piece of evidence that did not really sit well with me was the extra glove that detective Fuhrman found. When OJ tried to put the glove on and it did not fit him that really made me think that he was not guilty.
On the other hand some of the new evidence that was presented in the civil case made a much stronger point toward OJ being guilty than the evidence being presented during the criminal case. I think had the prosecution used the evidence

OJ "The Man"

Throughout the whole OJ case we saw many different areas in where laws were broken or people were being of accused of breaking a law. There were also many different views being taken, from the defense side to the plaintiffs side. OJ was known for being the star and being the person that everyone wanted to meet. He had a reputation of being extremely self centered and cocky, but at the same time he was great at making his personality seem better than it really was. There was a video in the documentary of a interview that OJ was having. It was suppose to just be OJ, but he said that he wanted his teammates to come with him too. During that interview he spoke about everyone of his teammates and said something good or unique about them. If i was a person who had just viewed that part of the documentary and not all the parts before of him saying "im not black im Oj" or "If i did a sponsorship for a brand it would only be the #1 brand" I would get the impression that OJ was a caring and love sharing man. His personality of him being jealous if someone was doing better than him or if someone had something he couldn't have led him to being on trial for a double murder, and later going to jail for an armed robbery in Nevada. This whole case shows how no matter how known you are, or how much people like you anyone can get in trouble and loose everything that had with a mistake that isn't worth taking.

The Juice

In the OJ case I believe that OJ was guilty, because to me the glove looked like it would have fit, but he was ripping it and forcing his hand to ruin the glove because no one watched him. I also think, if Vannatter and Fung had done their job’s correctly they could have convicted him, if the data aligned correctly. One thing that I would assume was that if the prosecutors had used different evidence, they could have convicted OJ instead of digging themselves deeper, thanks to Fuhrman's credibility. If they used the shoe theory that was used in the Civil case I believe that he would have been convicted almost immediately. The fact that he lied in court would be one red flag to go off, and then the finding of 30+ pictures in posted newspaper article showing him wearing the shoes would be enough to help prove him guilty. Another thing the prosecution could have considered was that the reading of the DNA was not well thought out, because most of the Jury didn't have an education, therefore they did not understand it and threw it out of their decisions factors.

OJ is he black, or white? Neither "I'm OJ"

Many people had many different views on OJ and his trial, many people were angry or happy from the verdict. Most of the people that were mad were many white people in America, and the happy ones were mostly the black community in the US. Now from this verdict, you could see the reaction from the people and it seemed to be a great deal to black people at the time and many in America were cheering and crying o joy. Now why was this were they happy that OJ got off without convicted of 2 murders, or were they happy for another reason. The black community was not cheering for OJ, they were cheering that a black man was able to get a fair trial and finally be able to beat the system, because in America there has been many unfair trails with different races, but seem to be more consistent. Black people at first would see OJ as a great figure for people to look to, but then when he was open about having no connection with black people and didn't help support the movement of the civil rights movement when he was probably the biggest named college football player at the time. OJ was asked if he was black, he responded by saying that he is just OJ. Now this response is fine and I can get what he is saying, but this comment really sparked a bad vibe with the black community it was like a sense of OJ leaving black people, and didn't care about them. OJ really never did anything to help people that really hurt the black community, because he was such a big star. I think him being a star really did get to his head, and started getting to comfortable with where he was in life, and being surrounded by white people, who really didn't care about blacks at the time, and that got to his head so he started seeing himself as "one of them." What I mean by that is he really lost where he came from, a single black mother and worked her whole life to get him the best oppurtunities and growing up knowing that white people called him a thug not even knowing anything about him. OJ really settled to go and stay with the rich white people in America and he really thought that they saw him as one of them. He was very fucking wrong. Now this is where I can get a little angry with this subject is because I see this now with many athletes now a days too. OJ you were never "one of them", you are a black male in America. I know you don't identify as that but you are, because those same white people that are there when you are rich and famous are not gonna be there when you fuck up, they gonna say things like he just another negro in America. So now if he is not really with the white people and truly not supported by them when he is failing, and doesn't help blacks, then what is he? He is OJ. I think that is fine, because as a black male I think OJ is a coon and shouldn't even be black, his black card is revoked.

Simpson

After watching both the civil and the criminal cases against OJ Simpson, my opinion if he was guilty or not became hard to choose. Right after the criminal case, I thought that he was guilty but with reasonable doubt, making it so that he could not be fully punished. I thought that the overall evidence of the blood and the DNA was very compelling evidence, but because it was not collected correctly, I couldn’t help but think that something was wrong. Also, I do think that it is possible for the investigators to miss certain blood marks, but finding splatters weeks later, and after having collected some of OJ’s blood to test, I didn’t think that it was reliable evidence. I don’t think that it is really possible for the whole police force to frame OJ for the murder because it involves more than just a little bit of tampering, but I do think that the way that the investigation was taken on was not correct. After the civil case though, my opinions changed and I was more so convinced that he did it. The evidence of the shoes is what mostly sold me. The one photo with him wearing the shoes wasn’t strong enough for me, but once they found 30 photos of him with those shoes on, I was convinced that he had to have been there. Not the smartest move on his part wearing a shoe that has only 300 of its’ kind in the US. I think that if that evidence had been brought up in the criminal case, the outcome could have been much different for OJ. Overall, I agree with how both juries ended up sentencing him because the evidence is what changed and what made the difference.

The Juice, Juiced Himself

OJ Simpson was indeed the man. Growing up in the rough town of SF , struggling was his everyday. High school came and slowly he became the man , playing ball was his get away. Later on playing JC ball at SFCC that´s were he exploded. He was treated as a king being the top JC recruit out there, he wanted to go out and go to the best school where he can pay the best teams and players. So what other place then the FTFO USC Trojans he there became a white man in black skin. He never stood up for his kind he stood up for himself, always saying he is OJ not a N*gger. Him playing there created a monster he was hungry and got everything that he deserved and wanted. But him living in such a beautiful city were the alums of USC ruled LA for the most part. He felt like he could do anything and get away with anything . Him always being the man and taking an L like his Ex-wife being with other men so he said if he couldn´t have her then no one can and that is when the JUICE, JUICED HIMSELF. Letting things get to him.

Simpson and Emotion

Throughout the course of our Simpson case study, we've gotten the opportunity to see how people respond emotionally to evidence.  In the civil trial, the bad evidence collection and opportunity for tampering was perhaps given more weight than it should have, even by members of this class (including me).  We love a conspiracy, so it makes some sense that we see every honest mistake and chance to mess with things as proof that things aren't going as they should.

However, there's also a very visceral response to Simpson's lies, for example.  We really didn't trust him after he lied about the shoes, the abuse, etc.  Partially, it was because it was completely ridiculous.  However, there is also that aspect of simply hating a liar.  His lies made sense, in a way.  I certainly wouldn't want to give the prosecution anything in my testimony.  Maybe there was an element of truth to some of his statements, despite the vast amount of lies, but in our minds, that doesn't matter.  He lied several times, badly, so nothing he said should matter.