Search Details

Word: goetz (lookup in dictionary) (lookup stats)
Dates: during 1980-1989
Sort By: most recent first (reverse)


Usage:

...first it seems odd that something so irrelevent to the facts of the case would take up the not-so-valuable time of commentators on this month's not guilty verdict for Goetz. Weren't there enough actual problems raised by the case--questions of the applicability of confessions, and the bounds of self-defense--without dealing with the larger, tangential issues of racism? While the facts are crucial, there are also good reasons why critics have focussed on the hypothetical...

Author: By Noam S. Cohen, | Title: Courts Become Streetwise | 6/28/1987 | See Source »

...Goetz case is not remotely like a lynching, but is rather the overreaction of a paranoid crime victim; a victim whose attackers were Black. It is precisely because there is no certain culprit--only a frazzled electrical engineer and a violent society--that this case is argued in terms of the hypothetical...

Author: By Noam S. Cohen, | Title: Courts Become Streetwise | 6/28/1987 | See Source »

...verdict in the Goetz case does present an example of how subtle racism--the kind that is captured in statistical surveys--can play itself out in a tangible way. When courts consider the racially-linked paranoia of a crime victim, race becomes an issue. When courts indulge this paranoia, the verdict has aspects of race...

Author: By Noam S. Cohen, | Title: Courts Become Streetwise | 6/28/1987 | See Source »

...principal reason for the verdict, and the salient feature of the Goetz trial is that the jury defined self-defense in terms of Goetz's own disturbed mind. Thus, the jury was forced to consider justice, not in terms of objective standard--which may be free of racial motivations--but in the terms of a frightened city dweller who had previously been mugged by Blacks. There was no effort made to describe the appropriate response when four tough looking men of any color surround a person on the subway...

Author: By Noam S. Cohen, | Title: Courts Become Streetwise | 6/28/1987 | See Source »

...city with racial tensions, we cannot allow for excessive response, especially if partly motivated by hatred of Blacks. In his confession, Goetz did not espouse self-defense, but revenge. He shot one of his aggressors in the back...

Author: By Noam S. Cohen, | Title: Courts Become Streetwise | 6/28/1987 | See Source »

Previous | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | Next