Ethical dilemma.docx

1 Ethical Dilemma Student’s Name Professor’s Name Course Name Date

2 Ethical Dilemma Situation 1 Two individuals are being sentenced for the exact same crime of burglary. You are the judge. One of the individuals is a 20-year-old who has not been in trouble before and participated only because the other individual was his friend. The second person has a history of juvenile delinquency and is now 25. Would you sentence them differently? How would you justify your decision? As the judge, I would sentence them differently while continuing to hold both individuals accountable for their actions. While rendering my judgment, I would consider the three important themes of justice, equality, impartiality, and fairness (Pollok, 2021). Equality stresses that individuals who have committed similar crimes should receive a similar punishment. In the justice system, judges are needed to ensure sentencing is consistent, fair, and proportionate with the principle of the law. This implies considering various factors, including the defendant’s criminal history, impact on the victim, circumstances and nature of the crime, and other aggravating factors. In this case, the criminal history of both offenders is different; one offender has a criminal history while the other has none. Since this was the first crime for the 20-year-old, leniency would be granted by offering a minimum sentence depending on the degree of burglary. Fairness and impartiality would ensure that both are held accountable for their crimes, meaning that sentencing would be done for both, but they would serve different years. Situation 3 You are serving on a jury for a murder trial. The evidence presented at trial was largely circumstantial and, in your mind, equivocal. During closing, the prosecutor argues that you must find the defendant guilty because he confessed to the crime. The defense attorney

3 immediately objects, and the judge sternly instructs the jury to disregard the prosecutor’s statement. Although you do not know exactly what happened, you suspect that the confession was excluded because of some procedural error. Would you be able to ignore the prosecutor’s statement in your deliberations? Should you? Would you tell the judge if the jury members discussed the statement and seemed to be influenced by it? In this situation, I would ignore the prosecutors’ statements during my deliberations. Jurors are required and mandated to be fair and unbiased during a trial. As such, disregarding the prosecutors’ statements would be morally correct and sound. If the defendant confessed to the crime, there should be documentation of such information; further the confession may have been coerced and, therefore, thrown out for various reasons. If the confession were to be discussed by the jurors, I would enlighten the judge on that information. It would be morally right to advise the judge if the jury discussed the statement and appeared impacted by it. If, after advising the judge about the situation, he does not see any need to stop the proceedings, I would consider myself to have done what is right. It is often difficult for any person to disregard statements that have been made during a trial. Letting a guilty individual get away with a crime can make people feel a particular way. However, it is our duty to act ethically as jurors; therefore, personal feelings and emotions should not influence our decisions. According to the ethical system of formalism, the prosecutor can offer evidence of guilt; however, if there is not enough evidence to find the defendant guilty, the jury cannot find him guilty (Pollok, 2021). The jury must decide what is right based on the available evidence and not on the statement in court. The judge made the right call, instructing the jury to disregard the statement.

Your preview ends here

Eager to read complete document? Join bartleby learn and gain access to the full version

Access to all documents
Unlimited textbook solutions
24/7 expert homework help

4 References Pollock, J. M. (2021). Chapter 3. Justice and Law. Ethical dilemmas and decisions in criminal justice . Cengage Learning.