Safety for the Witness story
The year is 1927. Mild-mannered gun shop owner Cyril T. Jones witnesses a murder by a pair of highly-wanted gangsters. Distrustful of the police's ability to protect him, Jones kills the gangsters with a rifle and turns himself in. The police, fearful that their reputation will be ruined by Jones' accomplishment, refuse to arrest him. Directed by: Norman Lloyd. Story by: John De Meyer, William Fay.
11 total · 1 choice · 4 major · 6 minor
| Theme | Level | Motivation |
|---|---|---|
| taking the law into one's own hands | choice | Fearful of mobster retribution if he went to the police, Jones decided to summarily murder the two gangsters that were after him. |
| law enforcement | major | A police officer interrogated Cyril regarding a gun Cyril had sold. Cyril was later dismayed when the police refused to charge him for two murders that he'd openly confessed to having committed. |
| murder | major | Gangster tried to murder Jones. Jones murdered two gangsters and confessed. In the prologue, Alfred Hitchcock apparently shot a man dead in a duel with pistols. Hitchcock additionally lamented that while duels had fallen out of fashion, murders were more popular than ever. |
| social dysfunction | major | The police department was too incompetent to be able to protect the murder witness Cyril from retaliation by gangsters. |
| witness tampering | major | The story centered on the problem of witnesses being fearful to come forwards for fear of being assassinated. In the story, the police were unable to adequately protect their witnesses. |
| coping with being ill and indisposed | minor | Jones had to spend some time in a hospital bed after he was shot by mobsters. |
| first strike tactic | minor | Cyril said he had to kill the mobsters before they killed him. |
| medical occupation | minor | Cyril was tended to by a nurse while recovering from a gunshot wound in hospital. |
| the gangster stereotype | minor | We saw mobsters in suits mowing people down with Tommy guns in the street. |
| the instinct for violence | minor | In the prologue, Alfred Hitchcock lamented that while duels had fallen out of fashion, murders were more popular than ever. |