MovieChat Forums > Find Me Guilty (2006) Discussion > Bad Message

Bad Message

posted 18 years ago by kaustin-9
40 replies | jump to latest

If this is even a halfway accurate version of the story, it says very bad things about our jury system.

The whole lot of them unanimously agreed to let all the mobsters off for all the crimes they obviously committed - not just a few times but as a way of life. Why? Because the con artist mobster cracked jokes, showed how human he was and convinced them he was just like them, the jurors. He talked about how much he LOVED all these guys. And the noble martyr BS at the end where he tells them to find HIM guilty (even though he's not, but he's used to it, he says) but free these other guys, that was so disgusting. The jurors had to be absolutely STUPID to fall for such garbage.

For the most part our jury system works. But as this story demonstrates, it is possible to come up with an entire jury of idiots, especially when it is anticipated that it will be a very long trial. Normal people can't stop everything for two years to sit on a jury. So they end up with dumba**es who have nothing else to do.

Very, very sad.

[–] kaustin-9 18 years ago

Another thing that was shocking to me: When Jackie declares to the jury that he "don't rat on NOBODY!", wasn't that clearly implying that he and the other defendants had commited crimes? What did the jury think he meant? Did they think that was a good thing? And what was Jackie thinking when he said it?

From everything I've read and the director's comments, most of the trial testimony is taken straight from the actual transcripts.

[–] j_captain 18 years ago

Well yes, but don't forget that the government's case was also weak to begin with. Their star witness was faulty. In fact almost all of their witnesses were faulty. This was not a flawless trial by the prosecutors. Sometimes it takes a smartass defense "attorney" or a plain average 6th-grade-educated joe to point that out to the jury in more ways than one. And when that's the case, you're always taking a chance at the verdict.

[–] therealcromar 15 years ago

Well yes, but don't forget that the government's case was also weak to begin with. Their star witness was faulty. In fact almost all of their witnesses were faulty. This was not a flawless trial by the prosecutors.

I completely agree. The prosecution's case was awful and even the cops they presented weren't convincing. Their "star witness" was their worst witness.

In a righteous system, guilty criminals need to go free if the prosecution fails to present the case. It's something we have to have to protect all of us, in case we ourselves wind up in court falsely accused. If we allow the government to just get free convictions without working for it, or without providing any real evidence, then they can use the same power against us.

Law enforcement needs to get a bloody nose every once in awhile to remind them to do their jobs. This is what people aren't understanding about the bailout situation today. These failed businessmen - and the next generation of future business people in college right now - need to learn that they will not be saved by taxpayer dollars if they screw up. The lessons need to be learned now, and if they aren't, the mistakes will not only continue, but escalate.

I trust the filmmaker's claim of total accuracy, so I say that the verdict was correct given the shoddy case.

[–] riku148 11 years ago

To expand on that we only saw a small portion of the witnesses and it was all sensationalized for the movie. What people don't seem to understand is that the prosecutors failed not because of Jackie but because they set up a convoluted case against over 20 people. Not only is it hard for anyone to judge that many people at once, even if they are scum, guilty without getting sick to their stomachs for having impacted 20+ families but also the idea of having hundreds of witnesses completely backfired on the prosecution. It's too hard to keep the facts straight and no amount of organization was going to help.

It's better to have a few witnesses that can really shine than hundreds of mediocre witnesses that just leave a bad taste in your mouth. There is no way the prosecution could have went through that many witnesses efficiently and because of that they ended up with a bunch of bad witnesses instead of a few good ones.

[–] bmks 17 years ago

Actually, he did not really matter what he said or what the jury thought he meant. The prosecution has the responsibility to prove the defendant committed the crime. The defendant does not need to prove he did not do it. Everything is up to the prosecution to prove the case.

[–] Hancockenstein 12 years ago

it's very frustrating to many people and probably equally so to me. regardless I still agree with how we should have faith in the system and accept verdicts, even if not an ideal one due to a weakness in the system. That "weakness" has likely served to also prevent unfair results for a defendant who actually is innocent or will some day at least

maybe it's a bit unrealistic for Jackie to actually choose to say that though, and a jury of people who are not perfect to react in any way but negatively to such a statement.

[–] The_Dougster 9 years ago

When Jackie declares to the jury that he "don't rat on NOBODY!", wasn't that clearly implying that he and the other defendants had commited crimes? What did the jury think he meant? Did they think that was a good thing? And what was Jackie thinking when he said it?

I agree. I realize that the jurors were burned out from such a long, exhausting case. Having said that, they clearly copped out and dropped the ball. It does send the wrong message.

[–] VarlOatesIII 18 years ago

The fact is that our judicial system is disastrous. Rapists, Child Molesters, Murderers -- any government that allows the most evil criminals, such as the noted type, to ever return to society is just as guilty as the criminals.

Rape, child molestation, and murder are permanent criminal acts -- not that any of the defendants in this story ever committed the two former types of crime. But I'm betting that at least one of the defendants, at one time or another, committed the third type of crime; of course, proof would be required to win a conviction. So, as for the three noted areas of criminal activity, you can't rehabilitate the perpetrator. But our government (for inexcusable reasons) allows these types of perpetrators (animals) to "pay for their crimes with time in prison," as if there is a price for committing such intolerable crimes.

It's a rotten system, so the outcome of the trial in Find Me Guilty isn't a shock.

[–] Weirdo123098 18 years ago

They were trying to charge them under the RICO act, which is a *beep* way for the judical system to bulk to the convictions. The fact that the prosecution wanted to try to sentence them all would make them fail.

[–] 18 years ago

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[–] Kakaroto 18 years ago

Dude, in a criminal trial, the prosecution's role is to convince the jury "beyond reasonable doubt" of the Defendant's guilt.

Beyond. Reasonable. Doubt. 3 sweet words.

Essentially meaning the jury has to be 100% sure that all evidences, facts and prosecution's case points to a guilty verdict. 100%. Not even 99.9%.

For, example in a murder trial. Even if your gut feeling tells you the Defendant is 101% guilty, even if he has a criminal record as thick as the yellow pages, even if he absolutely hates the guts of the person he allegedly murdered ... as long as there is a MERE *beep* in the procecution's case, i.e. lack of direct evidence linking him to the client, he walks.

Simple as that. The Defence only has to show the 1% missing in the Prosecution's case. This is called casting the shadow of doubt.

In Find Me Guilty, we are not told of the lengthy charges being levelled against the mob. Perhaps being charged under the RICO Act (and I speak loosely here as I have no idea what the Act actually says), there are many elements to prove for a finding of guilt. In all probabilities, the shenanigans of Jackie probably made the jury feel that the Prosecution has not adequately discharged its burden of proving guilt to the point of beyond reasonable doubt.

Don't go slammin' the movie when you've not understood the concept of the role of the Defence in a Criminal Trial

- Everyone needs a good role model. I'm happy with just the regular Playboy ones -

[–] phreak-11 18 years ago

it's as simple as that: you understand the concept chances are you won't watch the movie for several reasons. next chance is you watch the movie but aren't bored enough to comment it on the web. and the obvious third upon other possibilities to be in any relation with this movie is not to understand what's going on, having expected a mixture of the godfather and the jury and not seeing the point of a movie that's literally the replay of something that happened and upon its absurdity in a lot of ways should not happen this way again - and I wanna thank some of the above who compared this aspect of the movie to the reminding function of holocaust based movies. And as this movie is neither an action movie nor a grisham novel and due to the lack of an overly amount of humor this movie is not pushing your buttons in the way you want to be entertained.
So, which is the point of my statement, if you don't understand the whole conceptual point of this movie, that's fine by me, I'm sure there's some wrestling show on the other network you can highly relate to.

oh and if you didnt even get MY point then don't even worry about the point of the movie....

[–] SilverScreen_hu 17 years ago

I think, that you should watch the movie again, you shouldn't take it literally. This movie is exactly a twisted mirror of the legal system.

The best summary and the base of this movie is, what the Prosecutor Sean Kierney answered to his colleague when he mentioned, that one of the female juror thought about Jackie DiNorscio that he's "cute".

Lot of times you simply cannot expect objectivity from jurors (the strength of accusation is irrelevant).

[–] pacman-31 17 years ago

They were not on trial for all the crimes they obviously committed, they were on trial for consipiracy (the 'C' in the RICO act) so the prosecution had to show that they were all connected. That's whey they kept trying to link Jack and all the others guys' crimes to Nick Calabrazi to prove they are a crime family. If they were all on charge for specific crimes, when Jackie says "Have I ever denied using Cocaine" (which is actual dialogue from the real court case) they would have abviosly found him guilty then right? The whole point with Jackie saying how much he loved the guys, was to show that he loved them because he grew up with them and thats why they always hang out, not because they are conspiring to commit crimes. More evidence of this is when Jackie holds up the photo in the end and says the three kids were "Conspiring to buy ice cream." He is trying to show that they all grew up to together and are basically family. Just because one member of a family is guilty of a crime, does not mean they are all guilty of a crime and that is EXACTLY what the prosecution had to prove. Your statement may be one of the most ignorant concatination of words I have ever seen.

[–] vannalee-shop 17 years ago

I liked this movie. It was a bit of a farce. The jazzy score kept things pretty light. Not showing photos of dead people made it a lot easier to avoid focusing on the countless victims of the mobsters.

If there is a message to be made about the justice system, perhaps it's that prosecutors should focus more on evidence than on trying to make history and get into the record books with maximum exhibits, defendants, witnesses and trial lengths. The prosecutors came off as arrogant for overfiling indictments. If I was a juror on this case, I would have resented being imposed upon for this length of time, not to mention the bombardment of less than damning evidence from which I was supposed to conclude that someone must have done something.

They should have tried these defendants a few at a time for specific violations, which would have been more feasable under state laws than the federal RICO statute. But to do this, they would have needed seized evidence and truthful witnesses who actually saw crimes in progress or heard confessions, as opposed to those shown in the film who couldn't credibly connect the dots all the way to the top. The prosecutors just looked greedy.

[–] gormly 17 years ago

>>"If I was a juror on this case, I would have resented..."

would it have swayed your verdict as well?

If so that shows exactly that people like YOU (99.9% of us) are essentially what is wrong with our justice system.

We get an impression and no matter what.. it colors our views.

[–] ssbfz2 17 years ago

While they were actually on trial for conspiracy, the C in RICO actually stands for "Corrupt". RICO is the Racketeering In Corrupt Organizations Act. I don't know why the movie made the mistake of claiming that the C meant conspiracy, but it doesn't. I am not only a mob enthusiast, but also a law student. Your statement may be one of the most ignorant concatination of words I have ever seen.

[–] nightdreamer79 17 years ago

I looked it up: RICO actually stands for "Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations" :D

[–] EddieTheHead 17 years ago

I'm usually quite literate, but I confess to having never seen nor heard of the word 'concatination' before. What does it mean, pray tell?

[–] kaustin-9 17 years ago

Eddie The Head, the poster meant "concatenation". Only one letter was incorrect. Dictionary.com says the word means "the state of being linked together as in a chain; union in a linked series". When you don't know a word, look it up.

[–] vivekachary 17 years ago

Why, thank you! How frightfully nice of you to enlighten us mortals!

[–] gpgirard 17 years ago

LOL. 10 seconds on Google would have given you the correct explanation of the acronym, RICO. Using "big words" like concatenation impresses nobody, particularly when they are spelled incorrectly. Moreover, if you're referring to the post by the author with Pac Man and his name, in so far as he goes, the gist of his information is essentially correct. The law is well settled that the gravamen of a conspiracy charge is the agreement, not the act. You really should wait until you finish law school, pass the bar, and practice some law before rendering legal opinions instead of relying on a spurious authority as a "law student."

[–] frogca 15 years ago

> While they were actually on trial for conspiracy, the C in RICO actually stands for "Corrupt". RICO is the Racketeering In Corrupt Organizations Act. I don't know why the movie made the mistake of claiming that the C meant conspiracy

Sure, but a Corrupt Organization is committing conspiracy -- people working together for a criminal purpose. The two C's are intertwined, and I take it that the lawyer (Klandis) was using poetic licence when he described it that way.

[–] StrangledPalooka 17 years ago

If they were all on charge for specific crimes, when Jackie says "Have I ever denied using Cocaine" (which is actual dialogue from the real court case) they would have abviosly found him guilty then right?

Um...no. He'd already been convicted of that, remember? Why would he deny something for which he was already in prison?

[–] gpgirard 17 years ago

Actually, RICO stands for Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. The Act is very complex and subject to abuse in the criminal context on the part of the government and prosecuting attorneys. It can also be invoked in civil cases between private parties in disputes over money. For example, in the recent sex abuse scandals involving the Catholic Church, RICO actions were brought.

[–] donsugden 17 years ago

Kiddies? Just a movie - not a documentary. It was made for entertainment and entertaining it was. Don't screw it up by trying to turn it into something it's not.

[–] Ant_Lan 17 years ago

Peter Dinklage's closing argument (by the way, that guy has such a voice and presence, I'm gonna make a point of seeing "The Station Agent" and anything esle he's done!) pretty much sums up what happened.

This trial took something like two years. Take a moment to think back on each month, week and day of your life for the last two years, and imagine those being focused on one and only one thing: a trial.
The prosecutor became the Persecutor , Ben Klandis argues at the end of those two years. In my view, that's what stuck with the jury - the guy didn't even care anymore why he was putting these people on trial, he just wanted to win at any cost.

I'm far from a legal expert, but I was thrown back to one time where I had to testify in court - the prosecutor had three cases to argue in the same day, and didn't really seem to care that much about who he was trying to put away. I felt like he had a criminal in front of him, and he had to put him away, period. In the movie, Kierney had that motivation PLUS he seemed obsessed about them. I honestly don't know what my final vote would've been if sitting on that jury, knowing, as someone said in this thread, that you have to go beyond a reasonable doubt to convict.

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[–] BenFranklin33 17 years ago

That's the human element. Anytime humans are involved, mistakes will be made on occasion. Much better than the alternative.

[–] 17 years ago

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