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passage 3
P1
Criminal courts frequently rely on accomplice witnesses (witnesses who testify regarding the role of an alleged co-conspirator in a crime) and jailhouse informants (witnesses who provide testimony based on information obtained while incarcerated) for prosecutorial information. █████████ ███ █████████ ████████ ██ ████ ███████████ █████████ ████████ ███████████ ████████ ███████ ███ ██████████ █████████████ ████ ███ ████████ █████ ███ ███████ █ █████████ ██████████ ██ ███ ██████
Intro topic ·
Testimony from accomplice witnesses and jailhouse informants
This testimony is usually based on conversations between the witnesses and the defendant.
P2
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Problem ·
Cooperating witnesses have an incentive to lie
They get a reduced sentence of other benefits in exchange for the testimony.
P3
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Purported safeguards ·
Courts recognize risk of cooperating witnesses, but say there are enough safeguards in place
These safeguards include cross-examination of a cooperating witness's motivations.
Main Point ·
Critique / problem: safeguards not enough
Premise ·
Prosecutors may imply a benefit for the cooperating witness
Because it's not an explicit deal, they don't have to be disclosed to the jury. So, even cross-examination might not reveal the cooperating witness's incentive to lie.
P4
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Premise ·
Jurors might not realize how much a cooperating witness's testimony can be influenced by their incentives
Research on confession testimony shows that jurors don't realize how much a defendant's incentive to confess affects their decision to confess. This suggests that jurors might not realize the impact of incentives on a cooperating witness's testimony.
P5
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Explanation for juror's reaction to confession evidence ·
People tend to explain behavior of others in terms of internal feelings rather than external factors
So, jurors didn't seem to realize that a defendant's confession was due to external pressures (threats); they interpreted the confession as if it had to be an admission of guilt.
Similar explanation for reaction to cooperating witnesses ·
Jurors may not realize that cooperating witnesses are affected by external factors
Passage Style
Critique or debate
Problem-analysis
18.
According to the third paragraph, ███████ ██████████ ███ ██ ██████████ ██ ███████ █ █████████ ████ █ ███████████ ███████████ ██████████ █████████ ███████
a
current safeguards are ████████ ██ ███████ ███ ██████ ██ █████████ ██████ ████ ███ ██████ ██ ██████████
b
current safeguards fail ██ █████████ ███ ██████████ ██████ ██ █████████ ████ ██ ████████ ███ ████████
c
juries may not ██ ████ █████ ████ █ ███████████ ███████ ███████ ██ ███████ ██ █████████ ████ ███ ███████████ ██ ████████ ███ █████████
d
jurors tend to ████ ███ █████████ ██ ███████████ █████████ ██ ████ ████████ ████ ███ █████████ ██ ██████████
e
prosecutors are typically ███ █████████ ███ ████████ ██████████ ██ ███████████ █████████ ██ ████████ ███ █████████