PrepTest 121, Section 4, Question 13
Columnist: Tagowa's testimony in the Pemberton trial was(44 more words not shown)
Which one of the following(7 more words not shown)
- AIt overlooks that(20 more words not shown)
- BIt confuses facts(14 more words not shown)
- CIt presumes, without(19 more words not shown)
- DIt presumes, without(24 more words not shown)
- EIt fails to(17 more words not shown)
Reading the argument
What did Tagowa actually tell the jury?
The columnist begins by admitting uncertainty about her testimony, then relies on what she said publicly afterward. But a public statement that Pemberton is guilty need not be a report of the testimony she gave. She might have testified about something much narrower.
Imagine Tagowa explaining that a particular weapon could cause a fatal injury. Every juror could believe that explanation and still be unconvinced that Pemberton possessed or used the weapon. Tagowa might personally think Pemberton is guilty, but accepting her testimony wouldn't require agreeing with that separate belief.
What we’re looking for
That's the gap the flaw answer needs to describe. The not-guilty verdict and unanimous belief in Tagowa's testimony could coexist. Without knowing what her testimony established, we can't infer that at least one juror disbelieved it.
Working the answers
- ACorrect
A witness can believe the defendant guilty without giving testimony that implicates the defendant. Tagowa's statement about how a weapon works, for example, might not connect Pemberton to the crime at all. The jury could accept that statement completely and still return a not-guilty verdict. A separates her personal belief from the unknown content of her testimony.
- B
The columnist isn't arguing about what ought to happen. The argument concerns what Tagowa said, what the jury decided, and what jurors believed. There is no jump from a factual claim to a recommendation or obligation.
- C
The argument doesn't require juries to convict only people who actually committed the crime. It concerns what this jury's verdict tells us about whether jurors believed this witness. A general rule guaranteeing the accuracy of guilty verdicts isn't part of that inference.
- D
The columnist concludes that some jurors didn't believe Tagowa, not that Tagowa was dishonest. A witness could be sincerely mistaken, and someone could doubt testimony without deciding the witness deliberately lied. D changes a claim about the jurors' belief into a claim about the witness's honesty.
- E
Jurors could disagree about the significance of testimony without disagreeing about whether it is true. That distinction may sound relevant, but E doesn't supply the missing possibility that all the jurors believed testimony which failed to establish guilt.
The conclusion only says that not all jurors believed Tagowa. It already leaves room for differences among them. Merely pointing out that jurors sometimes disagree doesn't challenge the leap from this verdict to some jurors disbelieving her testimony.
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