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Why was it that every villain had to have his obligatory speech before he blew everything to smithereens? -Tina Folsom, Amaury’s Hellion (Scanguards Vampires #2)
Writing Prompt: Write a monologue for a villain who is about to blow everything to smithereens.
Journaling Prompt: Write about a time when you heard or saw someone justifying something bad they were about to do.
Art Prompt: Villain
Photo Credit: JD Hancock on Flickr
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The Pennsylvania Quakers initially introduced the concept of reforming criminals through time spent under confinement. The Quakers built a small prison, which was comprised of sixteen individual and fully isolated cells. This new concept was intended to achieve reform by forcing criminals to serve out their entire sentence in complete isolation and silence. The criminals were left only with a Holy Bible and the reformers believed that this would help them to achieve penance. It was from this practice that the word “penitentiary” was cast into modern society. Michael Esslinger, Alcatraz: A Definitive History of the Penitentiary Years
Writing Prompt: Create a scene where your protagonist is placed in solitary confinement and/or is brainwashed.
Journaling Prompt: Could anyone force you to change your beliefs?
Art Prompt: Solitary
Photo Credit: Dawn Endico on Flickr
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Confessions, when true, are an important tool in convicting criminals. But false confessions frequently play a major role in convicting innocent people. Experiments show that juries and potential witnesses are influenced by confessions even if they know they were coerced. Also in the lab, experienced polygraph examiners, fingerprint experts, and other experts, when informed of a confession, see what they expect to see — that is, evidence of guilt…
To back up these findings with real-life data, the psychologists thoroughly reviewed the trial records of 241 people exonerated by the Innocence Project since 1992. Of these, 59 — or 25 percent — involved false confessions, either by the defendant or an alleged accomplice. One-hundred eighty — or 75 percent — involved eyewitness mistakes. The analysis revealed that multiple errors turned up far more often in false confession cases than in eyewitness cases: 69 percent versus fewer than half. And two thirds of the time, the confession came first, followed by other errors, namely invalid forensic science and government informants.
Kassin believes the findings “greatly underestimate the problem” because of what never shows up in court: evidence of innocence. Told the suspect confessed, “alibi witnesses back out, thinking they’re mistaken,” police stop searching for the real culprit. “We show that confessions bring in other incriminating evidence that is false. What we don’t see is a tendency to suppress exculpatory evidence.”
The study throws doubt on a critical legal concept designed to safeguard the innocent: corroboration. Appeals courts uphold a conviction even if a false confession is discovered, as long as other evidence — say, forensics or other witness testimony — independently shows guilt. “What these findings suggest is that there may well be the appearance of corroboration,” says Kassin, “but it is false evidence that was corrupted by the confession — not independent at all.” -Science Daily
Writing Prompt: Write a story or scene about a coerced confession and its fallout.
Journaling Prompt: What would it take to get you to admit to something you didn’t do?
Art Prompt: Coercion
Nonfiction / Speech Writing Prompt: Write about a coerced confession that was recanted and how the case ended up.
Photo Credit: andrewrennie on Flickr
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