The Hurricane

The Hurricane is a movie about Ruben Carter, an African American who grew up in a town where poverty and discrimination influenced his life in a major way. An encounter with an elderly white man was what led Ruben to his first encounter with the cops. Little did he know that this would affect the next 50 years of his life with these cops out to get him. Ruben had thrown a bottle at the man so his friends could run away from the creep and resorted to stabbing the man with a pocket knife to prevent himself from being thrown off the cliff & dying. Without any evidence whatsoever besides the elderly man's word, the cops brought Ruben in & used intimidation, loss of control, and good cop-bad cop tactics to extract a confession. This was back in a time when African Americans were treated extremely poorly; whites were far more "important" as the cops explained who the old man was. Social psychology of this time pretty much had people programmed to discriminate against African Americans - an environment that made them more prone to violence as a form of self-defense if they were to survive. Though Ruben insisted he did not do anything, the cops sent him to jail where he spent 8 years until he couldn't take it anymore & escaped to join the Army. However, escape was short-lived, as the same cops eventually tracked him down and brought him back to finish out the time owed. Having spent over half his life behind bars, frustration turned to motivation as Ruben decided to "turn his body into a weapon," or as he called himself: a warrior-scholar. Once his time was up, Ruben pursued boxing & was successful despite bias referees who sometimes favored white opponents. Those same cops saw Ruben's success, shook their heads & called him a life-long criminal, so it is not surprising that they went after him again when there was a shooting at a local bar and they saw Ruben driving. Ruben was a victim of being at the wrong place at the wrong time; he had randomly offered to give a fellow at the bar a lift home and was driving through town when cops were looking for the two men who had shot up another bar. Discrimination was anything but discreet when the cops interrogated Ruben and John then took them into the bar for identification as well as the hospital where both the eyewitnesses at the bar & the shot victim said it was not Ruben or John. Irregardless, the cops were determined to screw Ruben over. They coerced eyewitnesses to claim that it had been Ruben & John by literally manipulating their cognition for the recording, showing the power they had to make the 'official evidence' whatever they wanted it to be.

Ruben and John were tried by an all-white jury & judge who sentenced them to three life sentences in prison. Being in prison is supposed to be punishment for guilty men, so for Ruben to suffer as an innocent man wrongfully convicted was punishment of even higher magnitude. He accepted that the prison had legal custody of his body, but he refused to give them custody of his mind & his way of demonstrating that was by refusing to wear the orange stripped uniform everybody else wore. Stubbornness got him 90 days in solitary confinement, where he was prepared to return to again if they still tried making him wear the standard uniform. Jimmy, a prison guard, seemed to form an alliance with Ruben when he compromised by letting him shower & put white pajamas instead. This friendship was probably psychologically beneficial for Ruben's mental well-being because other than that, he isolated himself from all social interaction, saying his freedom laid in "not wanting or needing anything that they could deprive him of." Emotions played tug of war in his head with one side riled up ready to fight & the other breaking down crying as he "felt the hate that made him want to kill somebody." Ignoring the dehumanization and discrimination, Ruben studied and became very knowledgeable with the law when he realized the actual legal terms for what had been done to him. Ruben said he had not committed the crime; the crime had been committed against him. He spoke with his attorney's hoping for a retrial "free from constitutional error or racial discrimination," but it was not until he became pen pals with Lesra (a young boy who had read Ruben's book in admiration) that any progress was made. Lesra and his three Canadians caretakers/teachers took the case under their wing & reinvestigated every detail with more scrutiny than had been put into it before. They faced threats from people who wanted Ruben to stay in jail, but still managed to undercover information that revealed the evidence had been tampered with. So even if the jurors of the original trial had not been racist or prejudicial, they did not have the opportunity to perceive and evaluate the evidence true to the case because the cops changed it to frame Ruben. Since the cops are the ones filling all the documents & reports, it was easy for them to change the time stamps or anything else that made it possible for Ruben to have committed the crime. Confirmation bias was not a factor in the cops' cognition, but rather, it was what they used to paint the picture to influence what the group of jurors thought about the case. The witness' statements were altered by the corrupt cops in a somewhat theatrical manner to persuade jurors, showing a huge flaw in the system that our society puts our trust in to maintain order and justice.

Conflict of interest protocol used today should have prevented this wrongful conviction before Ruben wasted over half of his life in prison, but during that period of time in history, it was white man's world. While the judge for the retrial seemed just as prejudicial as all of those handling the case before, he surprisingly ruled that preceding trials had in fact "appealed to racism rather than reason and to concealment rather than enclosure," releasing Ruben from prison at last.

terms: intimidation, loss of control, good cop-bad cop, social psychology, environment, violence, frustration, motivation, bias, discrimination, manipulation, cognition, punishment, wrongfully convicted, stubbornness, alliance, mental well-being isolation, emotions, dehumanization, threatened, evidence tempered, racist, prejudicial, perception, confirmation bias, group influence, corruption, persuasion

The story of Rubin “The Hurricane” Carter is one of pure resillenece and love. Even at his darkest points in life, he found some type of inspiration and always pulled through. The movie “The Hurricane” depicts the struggles that Carter had with a law and represented how love and perserverance can pay off in the criminal justice system.

Carter was not a stranger to the courtroom. When he was a young boy, he was sentenced to ten years at an institution for juvenile boys. He was only eleven years old, and he was scared of what would happen to him if he confessed to stabbing a man out of self defense. The cops used tactics such as intimidation and good-cop bad-cop, but they were still unable to get him to talk. Because there were no witnesses except for the victim, who happened to be an older white man, many stereotypes and prejudices were taken into consideration when sentencing young Carter. Social psychology helps us to understand that at this point in history, racial discrimination was extremely current and African-Americans were aware of that. Unfortunately, it was always the white person’s word over the black person’s, and they were almost always convicted of crimes that would usually be considered self-defense in modern society. Carter was ultimately deemed as a ‘menace to society’ and sentenced to ten years in an institution for boys.

After about eight years, Carter escaped from the institution and joined the military. His escape didn’t last very long, for he was eventually caught and sent back to jail. While serving the remainder of his sentence, Carter became a very motivated individual. He vowed to turn his body into a weapon and trained himself vigorously to become a fighter. After he was finally released from jail, Carter became a very successful boxer. His hard work spawned by his motivation while in prison had paid off. Little did he know that this wouldn’t be the end of false allegations against him.

Carter was eventually convicted of three murders that he did not commit. Because of his criminal background, occupation and race, it did not take long for the jury to decide that he was guilty of this crime. In some ways, it was a matter of ‘being at the wrong place at the wrong time,’ for he was with a kid from the bar in a white car, which was the same description as the perpetrators. However, the authorities were told on two accounts from witnesses, one who had been the victim, that Carter was not the gunman. The cops were not satisfied at this point and he continued to try to coerce the victim into falsely identifying Carter as the perpetrator as he lie bleeding on a hospital bed. The other witness who first said that Carter was not a part of the crime had changed his mind and testified that he was the shooter. We later find out that he stole money from the cash register before police arrived. Had the police used any of their cognitive abilities, they would have been able to piece together the puzzle and realize that Carter would have not been able to be at that bar at the time of the crime because he was at a different club. In addition, there was no physical evidence that placed him at the crime. Though DNA was a newly discovered technology, there was absolutely no other evidence that could have convicted him of such a vicious crime. Rather, the cops judged Carter based on his past and his present to control his future: life in prison.

While incarcerated, Carter became even more resilient and was determined to find a way to free himself from the nightmare. Many years pass, and just when everyone felt that all hope was lost, a young boy bought Carter’s memoir and was convinced of his innocence. With the help of the three Canadians that were fostering him, the group worked day and night to prove that Carter was innocent. After bringing about new evidence in front of the judge, Rubin Carter was released from prison. The judge was able to recognize that Carter had spent over half of his life incarcerated due to corruption and injust racism. Justice had prevailed and Carter began working toward helping a very needy cause: overturing wrongful convictions.

Terms: conviction, social psychology, cognitive, criminal justice system, intimidation, racism, good-cop bad-cop, institution, prejudice, false allegation, witness, coerce, incarcerated, corrupt, motivation, resilence.

The Hurricane is a movie that follows the life of boxer Rubin Carter. It depicts several aspects of psychology and law including racism and innocence. In fact the movie falls in nicely with the innocence projects we just did a blog on.

The movie follows Carter as he copes with being incarcerated for crimes he did not commit. He was charged with a triple murder and sent to prison for three natural life terms. There was a police officer whose name was Della Pesca. Pesca was always looking for ways to bag Carter. He would take any opportunity they could get to take him to jail. He mainly just made bogus excuses that didn't make sense, other than the fact that he was white and Carter was black. This was definitely not Pesca's first time placing Carter in jail, as he had done it before on multiple occasions. Carter was a famous boxer and Pesca resented him for it. He was mad that he had made something good of himself despite being sent to jail on false charges. Pesca also didn't believe that it was right for a black man to achieve so much power and recognition through boxing or any sport. This just proves how much hatred there was toward African Americans in American history.

Carter also had several run-ins with the law at an early age, including being sent to a juvenile facility as a kid. Upon interrogation, the cops displayed good cop/bad cop techniques, none of which worked. The only thing that led police to convict Carter of the crime was the victim. The victim, of course, was a white man. In that day and age, the white man always won.

Several years later, after Carter returns from the Army, he meets his future wife Mae Thelma for the first time. When the two were together in their home Pesca shows up to take Carter to jail. He claims that Carter didn't serve enough time as a kid. This is highly unethical in today's society. One would most likely sue the police. It just goes to show how racism pops up in the most unexpected places. All of the other men on staff have to agree with Pesca too since they are afraid to say anything in Carter's defense. This happens even still today. People are so afraid of being the odd man out that they don't say anything even when they know they should. It all goes back to group think and how it can have traumatic outcomes.

When interviewing witnesses to the triple crime, witnesses were basically coerced into telling the police that it was Carter who committed the crimes even though they knew that he really wasn't. This again plays into social psychology and how people can be convinced of things they know aren't true.

I found it to be really cool when Lesra found Carter's book several years after his incarceration. Lesra was the one who argued in Carter's defense and eventually set him free.

Overall, the movie was a great depiction of psychology, law, and the negative effects of racism. It is sad to think that people are still wrongly accused of crimes. Although it may not be based solely on racism, people are still being coerced into picking a certain person out of a line up. In this sense, the movie portrays a lot of what is still happening in today's society, minus the extreme racism.
Terms Used: Good Cop/Bad Cop, Interrogation, Innocence, Social Psychology

The film, The Hurricane, contains a great number of psychological and legal concepts; most of them revolving around corruption that is apparently very common within our legal system.

For example, when interrogating the key witness for the prosecution, Delapesca didn’t use the good cop, cop approach; he was the only cop. He also didn’t use the Reid technique; the witness was with a friend, seemed perfectly at ease and wasn’t suspect so the exculpatory scenarios weren’t useful. Delapesca simply threatened the witness and forced his cooperation. That scene in particular was particularly wrenching as we knew how things would end up for “Hurricane” Carter.

With an eyewitness to testify against Carter, Delapesca’s case was practically in the bag. As our textbook states, “the testimony of an eyewitness makes the difference between conviction and acquittal. Such testimony is crucial to the criminal justice system because it is often the most compelling evidence presented in court.” It also says this is only a problem when eyewitness testimony is wrong. This particular case, unlike the case against Ronald Cotton, does not involve mistaken eyewitness testimony; there was no mistake in that witness’s mind as he knew he was sentencing someone to a life in prison. However, there most assuredly incorrect testimony, but it was more of a sign of blatant corruption than memory failure. There was no problem with the witness’s encoding, storage, retrieval or even the memory trace. In order to cope, the witness (I can’t remember his name, but it’s the mafia looking guy) may have had an unconscious transference, when you think someone committed a crime so their face becomes the face of the perpetrator to you. Granted, at times of actual lucidity, he would know that he incorrectly identified someone as a murderer, but he probably needed a way to cope with his guilt so pretended as if Carter actually did it.

During the scene in the hospital, there are some very evident leading or suggestive comments made by Delapesca. The witness, who is under severe pain, states that Carter was not the one who had shot everyone. Delapesca walks in and asks him to look more closely and be sure not to make a mistake. He went on telling him about the likelihood of Carter being the perpetrator and the victim begins to doubt his original thoughts. Actually, I would go so far as to say Delapesca went past the point of “leading” or “suggesting” and spoon fed the witness. Even if the witness was aware of what Delapesca was doing (not exactly likely), he was under considerable duress and may just have wanted to move on so he can go to surgery. And as the idea of confronting someone was counterintuitive to healing, he just gave in to Delapesca and accused Carter. That witness probably actually underwent unconscious transference. Due to his weakened state, he probably forgot his original beliefs were that Carter was not the perp, but when he awoke Carter was the one accused and Carter’s face may have been the face the witness began to see in his memories.

Delapesca, should he have been a legitimate cop and worried about finding the actual perp, would have been concerned with how he handled both witnesses. The retrieval inhibition states that “selectively retrieving only some aspects of a scene inhibits recall of other aspects.” So if both witnesses were focusing on retrieving only the information that could put Carter in prison, they would forget the relevant information into locating the actual murderer. Delapesca, in all honesty, could have been aware of this inhibition and used it to his advantage to ensure Carter got convicted.

Also of note, the kind people who helped Carter get out of prison commented on a profile of the perpetrator of the crime. According to the textbook, profiling is not as accurate as it appears. For example, people tend to focus on what the profiler gets right and ignores what he or she doesn’t. I believe it was the case of the Mad Bomber that the profiler deduced the criminal would be wearing a doublebreasted suit. When the perpetrator was found wearing such, everyone became very excited and shouted the praises of profiling. However, his profiling was not entirely correct. Significant parts of it were incorrect: especially parts more useful in the actual investigation (how can you even begin to investigate people wearing double breasted suits? You can’t). They said that the profile of the killer was spot on in describing Carter. There were a few red flags raised in my mind. 1) When was this profile created? Even if the profiler was not on Delapesca’s payroll, if they knew Carter was in mind it would heavily influence their profiling. They may guess that the perpetrator is in his twenties…but if they knew Carter was suspected, they would say the perp was 25 (or whatever Carter’s age happened to be).

Terms: retrieval inhibition, Reid technique, good cop, bad cop, leading and suggesting, unconscious transference, exculpatory scenarios, eyewitness testimony

Rubin “Hurricane” Carter was an African-American male who had struggled his entire life dealing with racism and trying to fight against it. In a world where the color of your skin determined the type of life a person would live, living a happy and successful life for minority groups was an extremely difficult task. The Hurricane focuses on racism and corruption within the criminal justice system in the late 1960s to late 1980s and the life of a young man who overcomes the hardships that are a result of racism.

The Hurricane is a movie which depicts how racism blinded those in the criminal justice system and how corrupt the system became because of people’s hatred towards others. In the beginning of the movie Rubin Carter is convicted of assaulting an older white man with a knife. However, the police who investigated the crime did not take into consideration that the older man was attempting to molest young children, rather they focused on Rubin Carter being an African-American male assaulting a white man. Rubin Carter is sentenced to 8 years in jail for trying to protect himself and his friends from being molested and harmed. Sgt. Della Pesca, a detective who investigates the crime and who is also an extreme racist, allows his hatred for others to influence his actions and makes it his mission to destroy Rubin Carter’s life. Discrimination in these scenes causes the police to exclude and tamper with evidence, focusing only on the testimony of the white male who was attacked and not the fact that a group of African-American boys claimed that they were using self-defense to prevent themselves from being molested. Another example of racism in this movie is when Rubin Carter and John Artis are arrested and charged with triple homicide. Initially Carter and Artis were released and no longer considered suspects after witnesses claimed that the two men did not fit the description of the men they had seen. However, after Sgt. Pesca became involved with the investigation, Carter and Artis became the prime suspects and were eventually charged. Pesca is yet again blinded and motivated by his hatred of minority groups and focuses on the color of the two men’s skin rather than the evidence of the case. In order to make the case stand in court, Pesca used the two witness’s backgrounds of violating their paroles to force them to make official statements that Carter and Artis were the two men they had seen commit the murders. Sgt. Pesca used intimidation to manipulate the evidence in order to fit his case. Carter and Artis are yet again charged for a crime that neither man had committed because of the color of their skin and the stigma at the time that African-American males with poorer upbringing were violent toward others. The men were then tried in a court of law, which was presided over by a white judge and white jurors, making the trial unfair. This made me question whether the two men were convicted based on the evidence presented or whether the jurors were also racist. In The Hurricane, racism is the stem of most corruption within the criminal justice system and appears to drive the decisions made by the police. Pesca is clearly racist and is driven by his dislike of people of other ethnicities allowing his own personal feelings to interfere with his profession. This is an excellent depiction of how the justice system was run in this time period and how segregated our society was. Carter, Artis, and many other African-American males were put into jail and prison, not for the crimes they had committed, but for the color of their skin.

Although this movie is predominantly focused on racism and corruption within the justice system, I also feel this is a story about resilience and self-identity. As a child, Rubin Carter was subjected to a rough life because of the color of his skin and was eventually sent to jail because of it, too. However, after escaping jail, Carter wanted to find the person he truly was and make a better life by joining the Army. Joining the Army, I believe, made Carter a stronger person and is what shaped the person he became and the characteristics and morals he developed as he grew older. After being put back into jail to finish his first sentence, Carter then takes his anger and new found self-awareness to make a new life and career in boxing. As a boxer, Carter used his frustration with the justice system to make him a better fighter and used his new found strength to persevere through a racist boxing system. Carter is then faced with another challenge when he and Artis are sent to jail after being wrongfully convicted of a triple homicide. While in prison for the second time, Carter uses his solitary existence to focus on education and become more educated in order to fight the system. Carter finds an outlet by writing and writes a book about the injustices that he had lived through. After Carter is freed from jail and found innocent of the triple homicide, he does not allow his anger to over take him but allows the love of Lersa Martin and his other friends and family to drive him. Rubin Carter, although put through hard times, is able to persevere and be resilient to become a man that he could be proud of.

The Hurricane is a movie that I had never seen before, but I felt as I watched it that it was an excellent portrayal of how corrupted the system has been in the past and how our society has evolved. Rubin Carter is a man that survived an extremely hard life where all the odds were stacked against him.

Terms: racism, minority group, corruption, criminal justice system, assault, discrimination, tampers with evidence, eyewitness testimony, interrogation, self-defense, intimidation, resilience, self-identity

I would first like to say that this movie The Hurricane was the first time ever seeing it and it probably was the best movie so far that we had to watch. This movie was placed in the past based on a true story about racial discrimination, false accusations, and psychology.
Social psychology of racial discrimination played a big part in the past and to this day still especially during the time this movie was portraying. When Rubin ‘Hurricane’ Carter was just a little boy he had a difficult life during that time. A very important man was trying to pick up one of Rubin’s friends in his group which all were around ten years old and Rubin knew what was going on, and yelled at the man to leave though nothing worked until he threw a bottle at his head. Being hit in the head sure got the man away from Rubin’s friend. Rubin may have saved his friend, but the attention from the old man turned him, and the old man picked up Rubin to throw him off some sort of ravine. Rubin was smart and protected himself by taking out a switch blade, and stabbing the man’s arm several times. Later the cops picked Rubin up and during the interrogation room used profound language towards him. This is when we first meet Della Pesca who by far was the worst man in the movie. Rubin went to court and had no chance the judge told him he was a menace to society and wanted to lock him up in a state penitentiary, but could not since he was only ten years old.
Rubin escaped from his delinquent home for boys joined the military then eventually returned home. Rubin was found very shortly after returning and Della Pesca sent him to jail. Things started looking very rough for many African Americans at the time a lot of riots started and many cops were using excessive force one those who did not even resist. This is about the time the framing of Rubin ‘Hurricane’ Carter commenced. Two burglars found a murder scene, and had called the cops. While being questioned at the scene they were asked to identify if Rubin was one of the murderers they shook their heads no, but at the station Della Pesca used bribery to make them make the statement on recording, which was turned on right after the bribe, that it was Rubin to get their attempted burglary charges to just disappear. Della Pesca did not just bribe the two burglars but also he changed a time card of the police report for when the call was made about the murder to a later time because Rubin left after the time of the first time card so he would have been shot and not of been able to be framed unless the time was changed.
Rubin had a hard time in prison at first behaviorally he was very determined and not easily swayed to do other’s biding. Rubin would not wear prison uniforms since he was innocent this got him ninety days in the hole. Psychologically this played a major toll on him. He stood strong for I am guessing half of his time in the hole, but eventually he started doing anything to get his mind of being there. When he had nothing to do and all the isolation caused him to start having visual and auditory hallucinations portraying two different personalities of himself. His hallucinations of himself were the strong tough don’t take shit from nobody Rubin, and the other the weak emotional side of Rubin which he talked to both but mainly the tough Rubin since he was the one mainly in his head telling him things to bring himself down or ways to get hurt.
In the end Lesra Martin becomes a big part of Rubin’s life helping him to get out prison for being wrongfully convicted. It was not an easy road for Lesra and his caregivers because since Rubin was framed the people who did frame him were not very happy and tried getting them to stop but their determination to free Rubin did not waver one bit. Lesra’s caregivers did went through the case again and even went to old witnesses many of them passed away or would not give a statement since they were scared like the woman who wrote down the information on the first time card she said if she were to testify should would say that she knew nothing. The caregivers and Rubin did eventually find what they were looking for and presented it to Rubin’s lawyers which led up to his third retrial. With the new information being presented and going to a different court instead of a state court Rubin won his freedom.

Terms: racial discrimination, social psychology, burglary, false information, bribery, wrongfully convicted, framing, witnesses, visual and auditory hallucinations, behavior, and personality

The movie The Hurricane was about a boxer, Rubin Carter, her grew up in the not so greatest situations and turned his life around by becoming a boxer. There was one police officer who knew Carter very well and he knew that he was a criminal for life. So when a certain shooting went down that Carter wasn't involved in, the police officer pulled him over and made sure somehow that he committed the crime.

Carter grew up in a poverty stricken area with not so many chances for him to turn his life around. His first run in with the police was when he was younger and an older gentleman began to be touchy feely with one of his friends. Carter threw a bottle at him and all the kids ran. However, the older man got a hold of Carter which then Carter ended up stabbing him. The police thought at this young age he was going to be a trouble maker for the rest of his life, and they made sure he was put behind bars. Throughout his years in prison, he took on boxing. When he eventually got out of prison he became one of the best boxers around. Nobody liked that because he was African American, but eventually he began to be well liked. However, this would all change on the night of the shooting. Along with this story and others we have recently watched, eyewitness testimony fails once again. The two guys who hung out on the streets and saw the two men leave after the shooting, knew they were white and how nicely dressed they were. When the police officer who didn't like Carter interrogated them, he interrogated them in a way where he threatened them that he would put them away because of a parole violation. The officer wanted them to say that the two men were of color and that one of the men was Rubin Carter, and that's exactly what he did. Later in the movie when the three people wanted to get Carter out of prison, tried interviewing people who had witnesses or may have heard the shooting. Because of how long ago it was, people weren't really sure that exactly they had seen that night.One main point that was off was what time exactly the shooting took place. A slip said the shooting took place later than it actually happened, which would have proved that Carter couldn't have done it. Even with everything they had, the police officer made sure that he messed with the evidence in order to pin the murder on Carter so that he would be spending the rest of his life in prison.

When Carter first arrived at prison, he didn't want to wear the prison clothes because he was innocent. After spending the 90 days in the hole, he finally came back up and one of the prison guards wanted to help him. He gave him different clothes to wear that didn't have the stripes on it and also gave him special treatments within his time at prison. Throughout his years in prison he wrote a book which caught the eye of Martin, a troubled kid as well who was living with a family in Canada. The two had pretty much the same childhood which inspired Martin to write Carter. They became very close and Martin knew that he needed to get Carter out of prison because he was innocent. The three teachers that housed Martin became involved in the project to get Carter out of prison, and that's when all of the tampered evidence came out. Even though they had been threatened by the certain police officer, they weren't going to stop until Carter was on his way back to Canada with the three of them, and that's exactly what happened. The teachers read through all of the lies that were told at the start of the trial, and because of this they proved his innocence and he was released from prison.

terms used: murder, prison, evidence, eyewitness testimony, police officer, witness

A famous boxer, Carter was a star on the rise and could have possibly been one of the greatest boxers of his era. As a young man, Carter was no stranger to being in trouble with the law, and served time in a juvenile home. He later escaped, something that would cause law enforcement to profile him more harshly when it came to the triple homicide ensued on him.
Shortly after the triple homicide occurs, the police set out to bring the perpetrators to justice. They pull over Carter, whose care matched the description of the real perpetrators and shortly there after, we find that they have made the decision to frame Carter, and the unjustly process begins for him. One of the major themes in the film, "The Hurricane", was the prejudice behind the actions of the law enforcement that were responsible for Carter. Sgt. Delapesca displayed his racial profiling of Carter multiple times during interrogation and when conducting an investigation through the eye witnesses. The system variables, or the factors that can be controlled by legal system (such as eyewitness identification) were manipulate in a such a way to frame Carter.
The prejudice depicted by all members of the criminal justice system was the strongest aspect of social psychology represented in this film. The judicial system shows a zero tolerance attitude towards him and it's no secret that it has something to do with the color of his skin. The jury was even worse. The timing for Carter couldn't have came at a worse time. In the 1966's prejudice was a strong theme amongst the nation, and Carter became a victim of the legal system letting racism and prejudice hinder their judgement.
With little evidence, the jury convicted carter of the triple homicide and sentenced him to life in prison. The film did a good job of showing how the jury lacked not only the compassion, but held the prejudice predisposition against Carter.
While the descriptions the police were looking for fit Cater, (the care he drove matched the one they were looking for) and there was probable cause to have him arrested (The guns they found in the car), Carter should have been prosecuted on if there was viable evidence, fingerprints, and eyewitness testimony, or something that could have proved that he did not commit the crime. The reasonable doubt that went into this case was massive, and it was something that should have never been ignored.
Police did not conduct any of the required things needed for an investigation, and began profiling him as an African American man, and also used different techniques in order to profile him as a murderer. Profiling as we all know may not always be the best way to conduct an investigation, and also may cause discrimination during the profiling of minorities. This very thing happened to Carter.
The lack of testimony by the eye witnesses was something that should have been a factor in Carter's defense. Sgt. Delapesca used tactics such as threatening the witnesses and coercion in order to make their testimonies go against Carter. The amount of corruption that he displayed in the film was unbelievable. It was a great demonstration about how law enforcement held racial tendencies during this time. What's worse is that no one ever stopped it.
The police lacked proper protocol, and did not do a variety of things that could have proved Carter's innocence from the beginning. No fingerprints were taken, and which could have been prime evidence for proving Carter's innocence.
After studying the Innocence Project and the TAL, I learned about how innocent people are put in prison for crimes that they did not commit. Carter was a prime example of how law enforcement abuses their authority and are able to create an unjustly situation for the person at hand. At one point in the film, Carter says that "He did not commit a crime, but a crime has been committed against him." I think this statement thoroughly sums up the how a certain level of corruption may be present within the law enforcement and throughout the judicial system. It seems to me that this corruption may be strongly due to the prejudice within our society, and can lead innocent human beings to have their lives basically ended. This prejudice/corruption throughout the judicial system is a strong aspect of social psychology, and quite possibly the strongest aspect of wrongly convicting innocent people.
Another thing that the prejudice creates is a bias towards a certain color or race. Too often, we hear about minority groups occupying correctional facilities around the United States. This bias is one that can also lead to corruption and lead to unjustly situations throughout the judicial system. The jury played the ultimate role in Carter's sentencing and once again, the bias of prejudice seemed to be a factor in their rapid decision making about his sentence. Their ruling was set at life in prison for Carter. Life in prison for three murders that he never committed.
The psychology behind Carter was nonetheless interesting, and also was shocking to see how he handled what was happening to him. While some extreme emotions of anger, frustration and fear are to be expected, I feel that Carter was very strong and had certain goals and a sense of hope that kept him going in the decade that he spent in confinement.
In 1985, Carter was exonerated after almost two decades behind bars. The federal court was assigned to his case and after a very thorough analysis of his case, they ruled that Carter had become a victim of a trial that was processed by racism and hate.

Key Terms: Law enforcement, homicide, perpetrators, prejudice, Racial profiling, investigation, eye witness, system variables, criminal justice system, legal system, jury, racism, social psychology, evidence, convicted, probable cause, reasonable doubt, threatening, coercion, interrogation, discrimination, corruption, exonerated

the hurricane is a great movie that really shows the power of the written word and how one individual can make a huge difference in someones life. When Hurricane Carter first is sent to prison, he demonstrates a conscious effort to hang onto his own individuality. While the prison requires conformity, Carter insists on non-conformity. He sleeps when others are awake and stays awake while others are asleep. He refuses to wear the prison uniform which will make him look like all of the other prisoners, and insists on keeping his own clothes to retain some semblance of his own personality. That personality begins to disintegrate when he is placed in solitary confinement, and Carter disassociates, watching and talking to himself as though he were outside his body. Carter survives as an innocent man in a cage with criminals by the really heroic measures of holding onto his own personal beliefs and individuality. He becomes himself again when a boy outside the prison gets his book reads it then starts writing to carter. The family the boys is with decides to help and they reopen carters case to try and set him free. carter says "hate put me in here but love will set me free." Its was a amazing movie to watch to see of it unfold for the truth to come out how one individual can truly change someones life. weather having so much hate for someone to send a innocent man to prison or so much love for someone you barley know to set them free.

At the age of 11, Rubin Carter was wrongfully convicted and sent to prison until the age of 21. Rubin was trying to defend his friend and threw a glass bottle at a man’s head. Hoping to escape from the situation, he was grabbed by the man who attempted to throw him off a cliff. Rubin then stabbed him numerous times in the arm intending to save his own life. When the officers interrogated Rubin, they also threatened his life. Rubin was a black man and the authorities held this against him also. Before he completed his term he escaped from the prison focusing on his wrongful imprisonment.
After escaping from prison he joined the army. The same day he returned from the army the same officer who first sentenced him picked him up again. He was required to finish the time he owed. After completion of his time he became a very successful boxer. Once again things didn’t go Rubin’s away. A murder was reported in the area and Rubin was picked up as a match to the suspect.
There was no evidence that matched Rubin to the case but the same officers had it out for him again. They were determined to stick this case on Rubin no matter what. Once again the police won. There was false eyewitness that held up in court and phone records of a 9-11 call. An all white jury convicted Rubin to 3 consecutive life sentences.
As years went on Rubin wrote an autobiography explaining his whole side of the story. A young black man got a hold of this and read it front to back. He voiced his concerns with those he felt comfortable with and began fighting to release Carter from prison. As time went on fighting for the release of Carter the same police officers that despised Rubin had also continued to do everything in their power to keep him behind bars.
The movie is based on a true story, which is very unfortunate to know that our legal system can be so unjust. The story reminds me a lot of the wrongful conviction of Ronald Cotton. Social psychology plays a huge role in this movie. These cops did everything in their power to get people to say what needed to be said even if it wasn’t the truth. We learned about the different tactics of interrogation and many of them were used in this movie. So much prejudice takes place in this movie. You see it in the jury and how they didn’t even care to hear his side of the story. The fact that Rubin was black meant he didn’t stand a chance.
As it is said “innocent until proven guilty.” The main word in that statement is innocent. In this case he wasn’t proven guilty. There was no evidence that proved him as the killer.