Ben Pollizi
Mrs. Kimmich
English 10 Advanced
15 April 2017
Sacco and Vanzetti Shortly after World War 1, the United States was soon gripped with a massive fear of communists, foreigners, and anything that wasn’t American. This fear was taken out on anyone who was in America that wasn’t American. One key example of this was the lives of Sacco and Vanzetti. These two men moved to America before World War 1 had begun. Due to the fact that Sacco and Vanzetti were both Italian immigrants, and were convicted of their crime during a time of massive hatred toward foreigners, the justice system disregarded all the reasonable doubt in their case and declared them guilty. After the conclusion of World War 1, Anti-Immigrant feelings within the …show more content…
In this crime, they couldn’t find the suspect. “Two employees of a shoe factory were delivering a payroll of $15,000+. A car pulled up beside the two and the men were shot and killed. The assailants took the money and fled the scene” (David 9-10). The police has zero leads, and had no clue where to go in further investigating the crime. When Sacco and Vanzetti, two men who were Italian immigrants, went to pick up a car that was possibly the car used as a getaway vehicle in the crime, the police jumped right on these men, and arrested them both. The police were lost, they needed a suspect. Both of these men were Italian immigrants, so these men were already not respected by America, so the people would be more likely to believe that they were criminals. Sacco and Vanzetti became the prime suspects in this case based on purely circumstantial …show more content…
“It took them only a short time to reach their verdict. “Guilty of murder in the first degree,” said the foreman of the jury” (David 15). The jury disregarded all of the reasonable doubt shown, and declared them guilty without even much deliberation. Despite this verdict, the defense had expected this and were ready to appeal the verdict. New evidence arose after the trial, and this evidence should have cleared the two of all guilt. “Celestino Madeiros, who was a convicted murderer, wrote a letter confessing to all of the crimes Sacco and Vanzetti were convicted of. The lawyers of the defendants began looking into this. His description of the crimes matched almost perfectly to the known facts about the crime, and he was a member of a well known criminal gang that operated in the area of the murder” (David 16). Someone confessing to the crime, especially one that already had a massive criminal record, that should have cleared two men who had evidence against them that produced a lot of reasonable doubt. “The defendants filed 6 notions for another trial, but Judge Thayer denied all of them. When the defense wrote to the court, they backed Judge Thayer” (Costly). The law in the state of Massachusetts was that any appeal for a new trial had to be approved by the judge that originally oversaw the first trial. Judge Thayer was either too stubborn to look bad by overturning his verdict, or too mean to
Mrs. Kimmich
English 10 Advanced
15 April 2017
Sacco and Vanzetti Shortly after World War 1, the United States was soon gripped with a massive fear of communists, foreigners, and anything that wasn’t American. This fear was taken out on anyone who was in America that wasn’t American. One key example of this was the lives of Sacco and Vanzetti. These two men moved to America before World War 1 had begun. Due to the fact that Sacco and Vanzetti were both Italian immigrants, and were convicted of their crime during a time of massive hatred toward foreigners, the justice system disregarded all the reasonable doubt in their case and declared them guilty. After the conclusion of World War 1, Anti-Immigrant feelings within the …show more content…
In this crime, they couldn’t find the suspect. “Two employees of a shoe factory were delivering a payroll of $15,000+. A car pulled up beside the two and the men were shot and killed. The assailants took the money and fled the scene” (David 9-10). The police has zero leads, and had no clue where to go in further investigating the crime. When Sacco and Vanzetti, two men who were Italian immigrants, went to pick up a car that was possibly the car used as a getaway vehicle in the crime, the police jumped right on these men, and arrested them both. The police were lost, they needed a suspect. Both of these men were Italian immigrants, so these men were already not respected by America, so the people would be more likely to believe that they were criminals. Sacco and Vanzetti became the prime suspects in this case based on purely circumstantial …show more content…
“It took them only a short time to reach their verdict. “Guilty of murder in the first degree,” said the foreman of the jury” (David 15). The jury disregarded all of the reasonable doubt shown, and declared them guilty without even much deliberation. Despite this verdict, the defense had expected this and were ready to appeal the verdict. New evidence arose after the trial, and this evidence should have cleared the two of all guilt. “Celestino Madeiros, who was a convicted murderer, wrote a letter confessing to all of the crimes Sacco and Vanzetti were convicted of. The lawyers of the defendants began looking into this. His description of the crimes matched almost perfectly to the known facts about the crime, and he was a member of a well known criminal gang that operated in the area of the murder” (David 16). Someone confessing to the crime, especially one that already had a massive criminal record, that should have cleared two men who had evidence against them that produced a lot of reasonable doubt. “The defendants filed 6 notions for another trial, but Judge Thayer denied all of them. When the defense wrote to the court, they backed Judge Thayer” (Costly). The law in the state of Massachusetts was that any appeal for a new trial had to be approved by the judge that originally oversaw the first trial. Judge Thayer was either too stubborn to look bad by overturning his verdict, or too mean to