King Richard III Criminal Justice Analysis

The play The Tragedy of King Richard III by WIlliam Shakespeare explores the idea of retributive justice, the idea that criminals should be punished as opposed to rehabilitated, through Richard and his victims. Due to retributive justice, all of Richard’s victims receive precisely what they deserve, as Richard had the full consent of each of his victims the entire time he was manipulating and controlling them. An obvious example of this then, is Anne. She willingly went along with Richard’s plans for her own selfish reason, only later to be killed off when she outlived her purpose to Richard. An infinitesimal instance embodies itself through Hastings. In contrast to Hastings however, lies Buckingham, Richard’s largest case of manipulation and controlling. He is only

Fairly early on in the play, when Hastings was released from the tower, Richard managed to convince Hastings that they are on the same side, which was true at that point in time. He also made Hastings feel safe with openly expressing his beliefs to him, by talking about how bad the Woodvilles were. Hastings had some strong thoughts about that, as he proceeded to compare the Woodvilles to kites and buzzards, and the Yorks to Eagles. QUOTE. Due to this illusion of trust, Hastings is pro Richard, and willingly helps Richard with depreciating the Woodvilles. Unbeknownst to him until Catesby is sent to find his true intentions was that Richard intended on becoming the new king. Hastings, as a faithful companion to the late King Edward, is very strongly against Richard becoming king. He tells Catesby “I’ll rather have this crown of mine cut from my shoulders / Before I see I’ll see this crown so foul misplaced” (III.ii.43 – 44). He continues on to say that he still believes that he and Richard will remain on good terms if he were to let Richard know this, which is due purely to the way Richard emotionally manipulated