7 EXAMPLES OF A THEORY OF THE CASE EXAMPLE: THEORY OF THE CASE Outraged and angered by the dramatic bruises that appeared on the face, head and body of two-year-old Mary Smith, shortly after she was picked up from the home of Joey and Karen Burden, her baby-sitters that day, Mary's parents, the police, and even the examining doctor all assumed an assault rather than an accident, a crime rather than a fall, and that Joey Burden had hit and hurt the child. With little or no investigation and evidence, the police ignored and discounted the obvious explanation for the spectacular bruises on the fair complexioned little girl - a face forward fall on the wooden front steps of the Burden's home which produced no wounds, no bumps and no bruising at the time Karen and Joey comforted and inspected Mary and assured themselves that she was okay. EXAMPLE: THEORY OF THE CASE Faced with having accidentally erased the convenience store videotape of the cashier's murder - the only evidence of the murderer's identity, Officer Jones, desperate to correct his mistake by solving the case, coerced (forced) a false confession from Bill Smith, who was only remotely associated with the incident, by lying to Bill Smith about the evidence against him and threatening to prosecute Smith's sister and to take her children from her. Even though the only witness to see the murderer fleeing from the scene has repeatedly stated that Bill Smith was not the fleeing murderer, the police and prosecutor, desperate for a conviction in this bungled murder case, continue to prosecute Bill Smith, an innocent man, solely on the basis of an unreliable confession obtained by lies, threats and tricks.
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