PT113.S1.P1.Q7

PrepTest 113 - Section 1 - Passage 1 - Question 7

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P1

The jury trial is one of the handful of democratic institutions that allow individual citizens, rather than the government, to make important societal decisions. █ ███████ █████████ ██ ███ ████ ██████ ██ █████ ██ ███████ ████████ ██████ ██ ███ ████ ████ ████████ ██ █████████ █████ ███ ██████ ████████ ██████ ██ ████████ █████ ████ ████████████ ██████████ ██████ ████ ██████ ██ █████████ ██ ███ █████████ ██ ███ ██████████ ████████ ███ ███████████ ████████ ███ █████ ██████ ██ ██████ █████ ██████ ██ ██████ █████████ ███ █████████ ███████████ ███████ ███ ████ ██ ██████████ █████ ███ █████ ██████ ████████ ███ ████████ ███

Intro to Topic · Unanimity as a requirement in jury trials
This requirement compels the jury to deliberate fully and truly before reaching its verdict.
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Critics · of unanimity
Unanimity can result in hung juries (deadlock) which hampers the judicial system by forcing a retrial. Critics recommend discarding unanimity.
P2

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Critique (of the Critics) / Main Point · The costs of a hung jury do not outweigh the benefits of unanimity
Sounds like the conclusion. Let's see if the author can back up this cost-benefit argument.
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Premise 1 · Jury trials are rare and hung juries even more rare
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Premise 2 · Hung juries is not a bad thing; it's a sign that the system is working
P3

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Premise 3 · Unanimity increases chances of fair verdict
Decreases chances of a false conviction
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Premise 4 · Dissenting opinion is an important part of the deliberation process
Loss of unanimity will undermine society's confidence in the verdict.
Passage Style
Critique or debate
Show answer
7.

It can be inferred from ███ ███████ ████ ███ ██████ █████ ██ ████ ██████ ██ █████ ████ █████ ███ ██ ███ ██████████

a

Hung juries most █████ ██████ ████ ██ █████ ██ ████████ ██ ███ ████ ██ ███ ██████

Anti-supported. The author actually claims that hung juries usually happen when neither side has given completely convincing evidence. The author also claims that hung juries show that jurors are taking their job seriously, not that jurors are using bad judgement.

1%
b

Aside from the ████████ █████ ██ ████ ███████ ███ ████████ ███████ ██████ ███ ███ ██████

Unsupported. This passage is focused on the unanimity requirement in juries; other flaws of the criminal justice system aren’t addressed, so we don’t know what the author thinks about this claim.

1%
c

The fact that ████ ██████ ███ ██ ████ ███████ ███ █████ ██ ███ ████ ██████ ██████████████

Unsupported. The author does say that jury trials are rare, but this is not used to support the claim that any flaws in the jury system are insignificant. The entire passage is about how the unanimity requirement is important, so we can infer that the author disagrees with the claim that any flaws in the jury system are insignificant.

4%
d

Hung juries are ██████████ ███ ███████ ████████ ████ ███ ████████ ███████ ██████ ██ ███████████ █████████

This is supported. The author thinks that the benefits of the unanimity requirement outweigh the costs of hung juries. The author also claims that hung juries show that jurors are taking their job seriously.

93%
e

Hung juries most █████ █████ ████ ███ ███████ ███████ ████ ███ ███████ █ ████ ████████

Unsupported. The author actually says that hung juries usually happen when neither side has given completely convincing evidence. Also, the unanimity requirement ensures that all jurors’ opinions are heard.

2%

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