Self-Affirmation Theory Essay

Essay on Self-Affirmation Theory

Self-affirmation theory suggests that people can deal with threats to their self-identity by focusing on their self-worth and competence. This theory can be applied to many real life situations. I would like to describe the case of a friend of mine who used this theory to overcome threats to her identity and achieve success.

My friend comes from a very traditional Muslim family. Women in her family have always been limited to homemaking and child-rearing. However, my friend was inspired by feminist ideas and despised the notion that women have to be limited to private sphere, as her culture suggests. Therefore, she wanted to pursue a college education in law with a view of building a career and promoting the cause of gender equality in her work. Her family was opposed to her going to college, since they deemed it was inappropriate for a female.

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The family was well-to-do, so the girl would face no financial pressures in the future. At the same time, her desire for independence and self-actualization was very strong.

For several moths, she tried to avoid an open conflict with her parents and tried to persuade her that education and work are important for every person regardless of gender. However, her parents found a young man from the same cultural background for her to marry. At this point, the girl had to make a choice between family values and resisting the threat to her identity. The family told her they would not provide any financial or moral support if she decided to pursue education.

Knowing how competitive admission to law universities is, the girl was not sure if it was a good idea to start an independent life. However, she decided to focus on her strengths and competences in order to affirm her identity. She moved out, taken out a student loan and entered a prestigious law university. With the support of her friends and continuous self-motivation and affirmation, she was able to achieve her goal.

After seeing her succeed, her parents accepted her back. They have realized that pressure and blackmailing are not efficient in influencing their daughter’s decisions. The girl said that the most important lesson she had learned from that crisis was to follow her own dreams and fulfill her own ambitions rather than accepting authority unconditionally, even if it harms her interests. Positive thinking and confidence helped her a lot in those turbulent times when she had no one but herself to rely on. It is important to remember, however, that self-affirmation should take a realistic approach to one’s abilities. Self-affirmation should encourage continuous learning and personal development rather then discourage it. Expectations and goals should be realistic and achievable in order for this theory to work.

There are many situations in life when surrounding people try to enforce a certain identity and lifestyle on us.

Therefore, it is important to be aware of one’s own self and affirm one’s self through focusing on one’s self-worth that is derived from personal skills and strengths.

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Essay on Product Placement

Product Placement Essay

The influence of tobacco product placement in American TV shows on the audience

The popularity and impact of traditional television advertising have been in decline in the recent years as a result of increased costs and competition. Product placement is a substitute for the traditional TV advertising. It has been used since the invention of the small screen. Product placement is gaining more and more popularity and at the same time has turned into a huge, profitable business for both the broadcasting companies and the producers. The result of this situation is that companies exercise control with their product to such extend that shows are rejected projection or the storyline is completely altered. It is true that broadcasting companies receive large payments for placing a certain product in a movie, but the possible predicaments are much more. If there is too much product placement in a show, or the advertising is too obvious, the audience will lose interest in it.

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Product placement is not a new advertising strategy, but it has gained popularity through the new technological developments and in the last years it has become more noticeable as a common practice in TV shows. Nowadays, its effect is not so much on a subconscious level, but on the contrary - people do notice the brands displayed on the screen. The viewers associate with the characters from their favorite TV programs and that is the reason why they want to use the same brands as them. According to Bleicher and Heisinger (2008), in that way they are identifying themselves with the TV characters, feeling closer to them.

The restrictions on tobacco industry tighten more and more each day- no TV advertisement, smoking bans, bigger pictorial warnings and recently there are more restrictions on the use of tobacco products appearing on TV. Despite that fact, the tobacco industry is constantly growing and developing. The only tool that is not so strictly overlooked by the government, yet and that can be still used by the tobacco companies is the product placement on the small screen. It has a great impact on the audience even though without brand exposure. (Saffer& Chaloupka, 1999)

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the advantages of product placement of tobacco in the American TV shows, to compare it to the ordinary advertisement tools, and to investigate if it can be a good replacement. The growing restrictions and sanctions on smoking during TV time are to be presented and thoroughly examined. The current study is challenging and appealing due to the high public interest and the limited number of studies and papers conducted in this field and will be used to draw some final conclusions.

The focus of the following study is on the influence of tobacco product placement on the audience of the American shows. The survey will observe if smoking in TV shows makes people smoke more and whether tobacco placement should be restricted or banned at all. There are different studies conducted in the area, but very few present results that are not ambiguous and that can lead to general and final conclusions on the topic.

Another purpose of the study is to present valid results that will support or refuse the public opinion about tobacco use on TV. The answers to these questions will be of great use for our society, moreover the outcomes of this thesis can be easily applied to other industries different than tobacco to alter and improve their marketing strategies. The research and its outcomes will not only be useful to the public, but also to the TV producers fighting over TV ratings and tobacco companies.

      

The topic of the current study was chosen, because of multiple reasons. The matter of the subject is pressing and often spoken of in society by people working in the TV business or by government officials. The debates on the topic are intriguing due to the extreme opposite opinions of the parties participating.

Another reason for choosing the topic is the high interest in following the development and evolution of American TV shows. The ban on tobacco on Television is considered by some as violating the freedom of speech. The producers of the TV programs have to be careful to alter their stories to avoid smoking scenes. Many shows may lose their ratings or even worse may have to be removed from the air. People enjoy watching everyday life stories, so they can associate with the character. That will be difficult to happen if everyday things such as smoking cannot be displayed on TV.

On the one hand, banning the exposure of tobacco products will change the movie industry for ever. On the other hand, the exposure of minors to violence, drug abuse and excessive smoking is a serious problem and is desired by no one.

The audience intended for this research mainly is supposed to consist of scholars interested in the ways to measure the effectiveness of the placement of tobacco products in TV shows. The viewers of these TV shows will be interviewed and will be subjects to different field experiments, their perception and awareness of the product placement will be measured and described. However, as mentioned previously, the results will be of great use to all the parties involved in the tobacco business, its marketing and the TV shows managers. (Galician, 2004)

The writer’s point of view on the subject is certain. There should be various restrictions on tobacco products displayed on TV. The use of tobacco in TV shows should be also controlled. Different aspects, such as nature of the TV show, air time, audience and many more should be taken into account. The placement of tobacco in TV programs should not be banned, because then storylines and storytellers will be affected, as well as the viewers. Turning the tobacco into a forbidden topic, may have a negative result and encourage people to get involved, to object and protest against these restrictions. As a result, there is not an easy solution to this complex problem.

In the world of Television and Media, there are so many available channels to the viewers that many run away from the traditional TV advertisement, turning into real channel surfers. In that line of thought, placing a product in the TV shows, instead of placing it in the traditional commercial, increases the number of people viewing it and paying attention to it. (Galician, 2004)

The choice of TV shows instead of movies to conduct this research is due to the fact, that programs on the small screen attract a bigger audience and it is easier to estimate how many people viewed the episode with product placement and it is also easier to make the product irreplaceable part of the storyline. The problem of character smoking in TV shows has been a hot topic for quite long. There are constant debates and studies carried out to prove or disprove the impact of tobacco product placement on the audience. The purpose of the research is to investigate and to measure the impact of the tobacco products on the different viewer groups and their positive or negative attitude to such exposure. It will be explored in details which age groups are addressed by these placements, which ones are more prone to these messages and what messages are they conveying. Product placement for that kind of products will be compared to traditional advertising to point out its advantages and disadvantages and its public acceptance. (Mekemson & C.A., 2002)

The tobacco companies have a long practice of sponsoring tobacco smoking in movie productions, because they have understood its high efficiency. Although, they claim to have stopped that practice, tobacco marketing has been increasing, but becoming very difficult and innovative, developing new more complex marketing methods to defeat the restrictions and to deal with the increasing public concern about the dangers of smoking.  (Glantz, Slade, & A., 1996)

Traditional TV advertising has been in decline for the last years, however, product placement even though not a new marketing tool is gaining popularity and its uses tremendously increase. The TV shows business and product placement in TV shows has become a huge and very profitable practice, beneficial for all parties included, but the viewers. The media including movies, TV shows, magazines and internet form the everyday environment of young individual and thus have a great impact on their way of thinking. These media tools more frequently refer to tobacco products and in that way send pro-smoking messages to the public.

The tobacco industry and the motion picture industry have a long history of coexisting and working together. The product placement of tobacco is used to promote tolerance towards smoking and to increase its desirability among youngsters. The restriction on tobacco advertising mainly limits the print advertisements and promoting to children, but new means of marketing are constantly been researched and developed to balance its marketing strategies and their restrictions.

Unless more restrictions are introduced to tobacco placement in TV shows, that indirect advertising tool will remain the most powerful way to promote tobacco products, increasing the revenues of tobacco companies and endangering the public health. (Angus & Hastings, 2008)

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Standpoint Theory Essay

Essay on The Standpoint Theory

The standpoint theory itself lies in the necessity to get along with the dominant class for the reasons of survival. Therefore, the feminist theory arose on the basis of the social reality vision developed by women as a subordinate group (Swigonski, 1994, 390). In the process of formation, the feminist standpoint theory was designed by women searching for the methods to survive in the men-dominant world.

Feminism being a social movement referred to postmodern trends originally relies on the theory that there exist no differences between the two sexes, female and male, except biological ones (Harding, 2008, 14). However, it is argued that women are sometimes distinguished within the social conditions only and this causes controversies in the standpoints, while racial, economical, and historical views are often neglected and not taken into consideration (Harding, 2004, 318-321; 2005).

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According to Swigonski (2004, 391-392), the main tenets of the standpoint are developed through researches that identify the power of point and possession of knowledge as the determinative factors in choosing a role in the struggle for the feminist rights and freedoms. Education is a less powerful factor for that its impact cannot be objectively evaluated. Everyday life, however, provides deeper guidance in the relevant issues of oppression and can be the most influential source of maintaining a standpoint, especially in cases where previous factors are not easily accessible. 

  

Primarily mentioned in the 18th century, the standpoint feminist theory was accurately observed in the 1960-70s with the development of class and labor definitions and dawn of women movements (Harding, 2008, 14-15; Swigonski, 1994, 390) but not only the rich ones as originally observed. Later in the 1970s, the issue of discrimination arose involving women of virtually all races, cultures, and ethnicities.

  

In 1970s, women searched for the means of fighting inequality and dominance of the opposite sex in all aspects of human life. From diverse points of view, the movement pursued different goals.    

The following debates disclose where strengthening of the movement and improvement of confidence among the participants were originated from (Harding, 2004, 318). However, the participants were not always able to refer to the global audience because of the way how the various concepts within the feminist standpoint theory were socially situated (Swigonski, 1994, 390). 

  

As a matter of fact, the standpoints of women with different backgrounds do not coincide so unification of their experiences often fails. From the epistemological point of view, there is likely to be a group with a common interest in order to be able to struggle for this interest productively. In practice, feminists do not always share the same standpoint, and this negatively reflects on the performance of the whole movement. Harding (2004, 321) finds the right description for this calling supporters as “women who do not make up the majority of feminist theorists”. The fragmentation in terms of strategies and approaches makes the movement less attractive by blurring its main goal and idea.     

  

One of the feminism debates takes place around the position of a woman in the society. It is primarily argued that woman’s functions in terms of modern society are narrowed down to keeping household and bringing up children (Harding, 2004, 318). However, historical background identifies namely such division of roles between sexes pointing at these female responsibilities as the basic ones. Universalism theory complements this idea but emphasizes on treating any human as of universal quality, namely equally.

  

The debates also concern the context of the standpoint interpretation. Only feminist analysis observes women as an oppressed category. Social approach refers to feminists as a minority segment along with national, sexual, and other minorities that also fall under the so-called oppression. The way how the minorities are treated is virtually the same but with the only distinction in the objectivity and form of presentation, Swigonski (1994, 390) points out.  

  

Another misconception lies in the distinction between political standpoints where “female” and “feminist” refer to somewhat different meanings identifying that a feminist can be a person of any sex (Harding, 2004, 318). Therefore, it is obvious that the concept of feminist involves not only women but men as well, and there are certainly male supporters of the movement.

  

Final important issue mentioned by Brooke (2004, 99) and Swigonski (1994, 391) lies in the controversies of feminist members within the same group called “outsiders within”. The whole group of individuals can potentially have several standpoints, which should either apply to different realities or damage the integral concept.

  

Concluding the aforementioned, I would like to point out that the key to success apparently lies in the uniformity of the standpoint. If the opinions of participants and suporters differ, there is less probability that this group or community will get along. 

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An Inspector Calls Essay

"An Inspector Calls" is a play created by one of the most popular English dramatists J. B. Priestley. It is set in 1912, Edwardian England, just before the war. The time was rather difficult for England; definitely, that was the reason for the author to depict that very epoch because the time Pristley lived in himself had some resemblance with 1912. While reading the book, one can see a period when there were many strikes, food shortages and great political tension.

Taking into account the fact that the play was written and published in 1945, just after the World War II, we can mention that the country was also in disarray. Priestley tries to show the difference between these two epochs very effectively. Depicting people on their way to socialism, the author shows attempt to rebuild the society.

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Priestley reveals it in a very bright way using two types of characters, vivid conflict of generations and desperate efforts of the Birlings to keep image of kind, prosperous and responsible people. Pristley observes the classical unities of time, place and actions in his structure. The place – the Birlings’ dining-room – is constant throughout; and the action and dialogue all contribute to the central theme of the play, with nothing extraneous to distract the audience’s attention. The style of the play seems at first glance to be that of the straightforward detective thriller but Pristley is a master of different stylistic devices which keep reader’s attention up to the end of the story.

All the characters in the play are rather typical, which shows that the author tried not to depict a personality but to show the problems in society of the whole epoch using one of the upper class families and its inner and outer relations. All the characters are different but the most interesting person in the play, to my mind, is Mrs. Birling. The first outstanding thing about her is her leadership in the family. The author describes her as quite tyrannical person: “…about fifty, a rather cold woman and her husband’s social superior”. Evidently, she is more hard-faced than Mr. Burling, very snobbish, conscious of and uses social position for her private purpose.

Mrs. Birling is a chairlady of the Brumiley women’s charity organization. Taking into consideration her features of character it sounds rather ironically. So, let’s find out the reasons why it is so, why Sybil can’t hold such post. First of all, charity organization is created for poor or destitute people who need help, material as well as moral. So there should work people who sympathize with such people, who like them and are ready to help them whenever they need it. For sure, it’s not about lady Birling. She disrespects and even hates poor people, fearlessly expressing her prejudices against working class women like Eva. Sybil accuses the girl of being immoral, dishonest and greedy. Moreover, she can be seen as a heartless person in some respects, especially in the way she receives the news about Eva Smith's suicide. She dismisses the news, not able to see how the death of a lower class person could be of any interest to, or connected to the Birlings. Sybil seems to think that such people have different feelings to her own, that they are less human than she is. She sees Eva's pleas as being evidence of 'giving herself ridiculous airs' and of 'claiming elaborate fine feelings' that are restricted to people of Sybil's own social standing.

One more reason is that Mrs. Birling seems to be completely detached from the problems of her own family. She thinks that her son is still a little child though he had already become an alcoholic, she’s ignorant at her daughter’s troubles. So how can a woman so selfish, that doesn’t care about her own family, think about lower-class people?

Sybil is rather sly woman. When inspector stars asking her questions she hides behind words such as 'truth', 'duty' and 'deserving’, she finds every his word ‘offensive’ and obviously doesn’t feel responsible for Eva’s death though actually she refused to help the girl when she had asked to. If to suppose that the chair lady would have been a kind woman there wouldn’t be any suicide. The matter is that the girl felt too miserable, she appeared in a world of cruelty and lack of understanding. Eva came to charity organization because it was her last way out. But Mrs. Birling humiliated her and it was the last straw for the girl. The woman told her that it’s the father of the child who is responsible. The reader is aware of the fact that Eric is the father of the child, but Eva couldn’t stand that she was used by a rich alcoholic.

The ending of the play makes everything clear: all the members of the family are guilty in Eva’s death. But most of the blame is on Sybil who using her influence persuaded the other members of her charitable group not to help Eva in order to avoid problems in her own family. Nonetheless Sybil Birling refuses to accept any part of the blame for Eva's death, despite her actions, which contributed to its occurrence and is so sure of her beliefs that she states she is not at all ashamed. So we can see that even in the end Sybil didn’t learn to behave in a compassionate or caring way, her attitude towards lower class became even worse. That is why we can make a conclusion that Sybil Birling couldn’t be a chair lady of Brumiley women’s charity organization and should be removed from her position.

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Free Political Science Essay

Free Essay on Political Science

Interest groups get their abilities to influence the political process because in some major ways, their opinions are even greater than the process itself. One such group, the National Committee for an Effective Congress, puts it this way: “For all intents and purposes, the Democratic and Republican parties don’t exist. There are only individuals and professionals”. In many ways this is very true in the eyes of the public.

Candidacy for President, for example, used to be all about running on a stable political platform. While to a certain extent it still is about that, these days it has become a lot more about personal image and name recognition. This is exactly why interest groups have become so powerful in the political sphere.

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The public’s eyes have been averted from the politics of the candidate himself in order to focus on campaign contributions and donations to different organizations. These organizations then, with their enormous power of public relations, reciprocate by openly supporting that candidate.

Businessmen are another case. David Vogel and Leonard Silk, a political scientist and New York Times business columnist conducted research on a meeting of American businessmen in the mid 70’s. Their documentation suggested that businessmen believe that the government has completely stopped paying any attention to them and in some cases directly harassing them, resulting in a lack of motivation to invest their capital. Much of this animosity stems from the New Deal and the social programs of the 1960's. Their only outlet to make meaningful changes in politics, then, is to appeal to interest groups.

Over the years, interest groups have become something of a political substitute, as the different groups break down political issues into a more easily understood fragmentation. By paying attention to interest groups, people have a better understanding of the specific issues that those groups represent. Keeping one’s finger on the pulse of interest groups and paying attention to the information they provide, one could greatly decrease the amount of confusion notoriously generated by political debate. This is because one simply get the facts about certain political issues and are free to make up his/her own opinions regarding them.

  

This observation carries with it implications that certainly influences the political process. Voting, for example, is greatly affected by this because voting in an intellectually honest way, requires making an informed decision. What better way of being informed than by listening to organizations whose purpose it is to collect, analyze and interpret the data, information and statistics of their interest? Collectively speaking, society as a whole will change its political behavior based on the source of information that it gets.

  

The reason some interest groups today are more influential than others is because they may get the most support from its subscribers, members, contributions/external support, or sometimes even the government such as in the case of the New Deal program, which caused the government to strengthen certain interest groups.

  

It can be deduced then, that the US has become a beacon for interest groups. It has gotten to the point that certain countries now have interest groups influencing the US government. It is a dangerous road that America has been on for a while, one which, if it continues to traverse, might leave it in the dust. (Domhoff, 1983)

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Essay on Fiduciary Duty

Fiduciary Duty: Duty of Care and Duty of Loyalty

The recent financial crisis and the economic turmoil it has brought about unveiled more than a few weaknesses of the current financial services industry. Is has shown, for instance, that some of the latter’s economic predictions and financial investments proven to be utterly wrong. But equally (and sometimes even more) severe were the accumulating evidence that the financial sector’s seemingly strict codes of conduct – which allow them to be as powerful as they are – have been breached too often and for too long.

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The backbone of the whole financial sector is trust. Individuals, institutions and countries allow the financial sector to hold, manage and invest their liquid equity because they neither a plausible alternative to the current structure of the banking system, nor they have a reason to doubt financial firm’s commitment to its clients. This commitment, known as fiduciary duty, is the subject matter of this paper, which calls for a rigorous rethinking about the concept in light of the recent financial crisis.

A discussion about fiduciary duty usually revolves around two kinds of duties, namely duty of loyalty and duty of care. The specific characteristics of each duty (in terms of the behaviors they prescribes) may vary among contexts (e.g. corporate vs. financial affairs) and/or fiduciaries (e.g. directors vs. investment bankers), but the general meanings of these two duties define fiduciaries’ responsibilities to principals in terms of:

• Duty of loyalty: an obligation on behalf of the fiduciaries to put the principles’ interests ahead of their own and to avoid conflict of interests
• Duty of care: the fiduciaries’ to serve principles’ best interests and to avoid acts and/or omissions that may lead to inferior results.  

Taking the case of Enron as an example, the company’s executives and clearly violated their duty of loyalty to their shareholders. In contrast, Enron’s auditors Arthur Andersen seem to have failed to meet their requirements under duty of care, as they could discover Enron executives’ fraudulent deeds but did not do so. However, the assumption regarding Arthur Andersen’s failures in the field of duty of care indicates a serious flaw in the definition of this duty.

The problem with duty of care is that except extreme cases in which fiduciaries act in an utterly irrational fashion, there is no legal way to link the disastrous effects of their actions to a breach of duty of care (Black, 2001). This is because of the fact that, simply put, “there is no general principal that will determine the existence and scope of a duty of care in all cases” (Brooks & Dunn, 2010, p. 458). By the same token, it seems that the current definition of fiduciary duties is too weak to prevent the aggressive and irresponsible behavior, which led to the 2008 collapse of Lehman Brothers (“Oh, brother”, 2010).

But even if the duty of care is relatively weaker than the duty of loyalty (Black, 2001), one should not be too confident about the latter duty’s premise to secure invertors’ interests. Even when firms maintain strict policies to prevent conflict of interests there is always a considerable risk of insider trading in the financial firm’s own stock and/or in assets it controls. All it takes to get there is one employee with a big mouth and a poor sense of ethics. This is especially true for workers of struggling firm, and even considering by hardcore capitalists as a natural mechanism to ensure and predict fair market prices (Bandow, 2010). In fact, the digital era allows any employee to post information with devastating implications on an anonymous blog, thereby violating his or her duties without ever being caught (Lee, 2006).

Needless to say that even a stricter set of enforcement for issues of fiduciary duty and corresponding obligations would not able to prevent opportunists from using their clean and decent image to deceive investors. The perfect example for this case is Bernard Madoff, who could not carry out his mega ponsi scheme without his (apparent) high fiduciary duty standards, as demonstrated in his career in Wall Street (Creswell & Thomas, 2009).

The evidences discussed in this paper and others leave a very little room to doubt that fiduciary duty is based too much gentlemen’s codes to be considered as strong grounds for investors. However, it is not so certain that strengthening the legal holdings of fiduciary duties can contribute to solving current weaknesses in financial markets; instead, there are good grounds to the argument that increasing the scope of fiduciary duty will result in greater complexity of management and control without reaching material improvement in stakeholders’ rights (Harman, 2010). Possible remedies should therefore stem from other components of the legal framework that surrounds our bulky financial system.  

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Criminology Essay

In summary the situations looks like the following: the only survived victim of a series of robberies and murders was able to positively identify a perpetrator from an array of photographs; later the victim being in sound mind was able to clearly identify the defendant at the preliminary hearing and respond to cross-examination. After these events the victim died. Police did not find the weapon or fingerprints, ballistic fingerprints could not identify the weapons.

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Generally, police can use several methods so as to identify a suspect as a perpetrator: lineup – identification from the group of people with similar patterns, showup – “one-on-one identification procedure” and photo identification – it “consist of witnesses looking at photos of suspects… most persons whose photos are displayed in photo identifications have prior criminal records” (Bergman & Bergman-Barret, 2003, section 4/19). Positive identification resulted by any of the above methods can be a reason to file criminal charges against suspect. Positive identification is also admissible as evidence at the trial, but the attorney can argue and further the court to exclude such evidences. The reasons for excluding identification as evidence may vary and the one that can be used in this particular case is that the witness was frightened.

The purpose of preliminary hearing is to determine whether the defendant should be tried and the prosecutor has any evidences that can prove the guilt of the defendant. This procedure does not imply prosecutor has to provide all the evidences available “but only enough evidence to convince the judge that there is probable cause to hold the defendant for trial” (Bergman & Bergman-Barret, 2003, section 16/3). All testimonies given at the preliminary hearing may be used at trial but in specific way – if somebody changes given before testimonies and the court needs to select which testimonies are more reliable. In addition, all testimonies given at preliminary hearing are subject to be repeated at trial under oath. Our victim has died before the trial and his testimonies could not be proved under oath. Of course they will be used in the court but the defendant’s attorney, probably, will be able to exclude them or dissolve their value for prosecution because there are no evidences available. The fact that victim responded to cross-examination works for prosecution because defense lawyer was not able to further the court to exclude them. Hence the testimony of the deceased victim could not be used as direct evidence at trial but as indirect only in the form of written transcript. This testimony is not proved under oath so far and the lawyer can insist that the victim may refuse to confirm this testimony at trial. “At trial, the prosecution has the burden of proving each element of the charged offense(s) beyond a reasonable doubt” (Bergman & Bergman-Barret, 2003, section 16/4) and in our case prosecution will not be able to do this without the victim despite victim’s testimony looks to be very likely.

The fact that series of robberies and murders stopped with the arrest of the defendant is not evidence. Under the presumption of innocence prosecution is to prove the guilt of the defendant, not the defendant prove his innocence. In addition, the defendant can “get” alibi if somebody is able to verify the defendant’s location at the time of felony. Defense lawyer can draw many reasons for the series of robberies and murders being stopped without arresting the defendant.

Ballistic fingerprints are the sort of scientific evidence. The concept of ballistic fingerprints implies all weapons to be identified before going on sale and stored in the database so as to have a possibility of identifying the weapon in future. In our case the weapon was not identified. This means the police is not able to find the owner of the weapon. The only practical value of ballistic fingerprints in this case is connecting the series of robberies and murders into the single case. If the police could find the weapon with fingerprints of the defendant it would be incontrovertible evidence of the defendant’s guilt.

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