Central Park Five Conflict Theory

The Central Park Five is the story of five teenagers, 14 to 16, four of whom were African American and the other of Hispanic origin, who were wrongly accused and convicted of the sexual assault of a white woman in New York City’s Central Park. Prior to the assault, these teenagers were detained by police officers in connection with the large number of assaults in Central Park committed by a group of roughly around 25 teenagers. Although they were not engaging in the criminal activities of the group, they were still brought into the Central Park Precinct. On the same night of questioning, a woman was reported to have been assaulted and raped. After hours of aggressive interrogation, all five of them confessed to the attacks in the park and incriminated

Karl Max developed conflict theory that suggests that people are in competition with one another over resources, power, and inequality. The criminal law aspect of the theory can be defined as a theory that assumes that society is based primarily on conflict between competing interest groups and that criminal law and the criminal justice system are used to control subordinate groups (Bohm & Haley, 2009). Examples of the competition between groups can include but not be limited to the rich against the poor, management against labor, whites against minorities, men against women, and adults against children (Bohm & Haley, 2009). Conflict theorists assert that social order is maintained by authority backed by the use of force (Zastrow & Kirst-Ashman, 2006). They assert that the privileged classes hold legal power and use the legal system to make others obey their will. They conclude that most people obey the law because they are afraid of being arrested, imprisoned, or even killed if they do not obey (Zastrow & Kirst-Ashman, 2006). Furthermore, conflict theorists state that public image legitimizes the authority and practices of dominant groups and allows them to achieve their own interests at the expense of less powerful groups (Bohm & Haley, 2009). It deflects the attention of subordinate group members from the many problems that dominant groups create for them and turns that attention to

In this documentary, the conflict resulted between whites against minorities, police officers against minorities, and the criminal justice system against minorities. From this documentary, it can be gathered that conflict will always reside between another group and minorities as it relates to crime. The Central Park Five intertwines the stories of five teenaged boys, the victim, police officers and prosecutors, and the actual man responsible for the crime, as the documentary unravels the forces behind the wrongful convictions. Again, the five teenagers were taken into custody by police officers in connection with the number of assaults in Central Park committed by a group of teenagers. Although they indicated that they were not participating with the group, they were still brought into the Central Park Precinct. On the same night, a woman was reported to have been assaulted and raped. Immediately, these five teenaged boys were discriminated against for the sexual assault of the white woman because they were in the park that night as well as the color of their skin. At the time, the suspects were black and the victim was white. Under the circumstances of the case, they were already presumed guilty because of race. As the investigation continued, the teens were interrogated for approximately 30 hours before falsely confessing to the crime. The police officers and detectives who they were