Basic Trope: Someone is guilty of a crime, but framed for it or another crime.
- Straight:
- Bob murders Alice, then cleans the knife used in the crime. The police plant his prints on the knife and soak it in Alice's blood.
- The police are unable to locate sufficient evidence to convict Bob for Alice's murder, but discover he was nearby when an armed robbery occurred. Bob genuinely has nothing to do with said robbery and the police know it, but they nonetheless frame him as complicit in order to charge him with a crime.
- Exaggerated: Multiple pieces of evidence are produced to make Bob look guilty, such as shoeprints, fingerprints, DNA, and tire tracks. In addition, several witnesses perjure themselves. Bob is actually guilty of the crime.
- Downplayed: A witnesses spots Bob at the scene but does not get a close look. The detectives give him some details to make his testimony more convincing.
- Justified: The detectives have psychic abilities to know that Bob is guilty.
- Inverted: Alice sees Bob with a positive opiate test and tries to make him look innocent. As he was legitimately prescribed them this that makes him look like a drug dealer.
- Subverted: Bob wonders how they could have gotten his prints of the scene, given that he cleaned it well. Turns out he did not clean as thoroughly as he thought.
- Double Subverted: The detectives did not find the real evidence, instead planting fake evidence.
- Parodied:
- The police put a photo frame around his neck and use that as "proof" that he murdered Alice!
- The fabricated evidence used against Bob is a photo of the crime scene with Bob obviously photoshopped into it while holding the knife, with a cartoon speech bubble over him saying "I killed her". Everyone believes it.
- Zig-Zagged: ???
- Averted: ???
- Enforced: "We need the heroes to bend the law for a good cause."
- Lampshaded: "If you truly know enough to prove he is guilty then why do you have to lie?"
- Implied: Bob was known to be guilty of other crimes yet he arose as a Revenant Zombie after he was hanged and goes after the Hanging Judge.
- Invoked: Bob frames himself with evidence which looks superficially good but fall apart upon closer examination as a clear frame up.
- Exploited: Bob and his attorney use flaws in the evidence to prove it was planted.
- Defied: Da Chief refuses to use such a tactic, and threatens to fire and jail anyone willing to.
- Discussed: "They never think their sloppy plans through. Even if they were right, just one piece proven falsified throws the whole case in doubt. The only way to truly have a secure conviction is to have the right person, the right evidence, the right reasoning, and the right process. But that way is hard compared to faking it."
- Conversed: ???
- Deconstructed:
- The evidence does not hold up in court and Bob goes free.
- The nature of the forgery makes the police suspected of being the guilty party.
- The discovery that Bob has been framed for crimes he never committed leads to a Crying Wolf effect where nobody takes any accusation against him seriously; including for the crimes he DID commit.
- Reconstructed: The fake evidence gives the detectives permission to look closer, and find real evidence that ends up getting Bob declared guilty of the crime.
- Played for Drama: Bob murders Alice without leaving any usable evidence. The police know he did it, but since they have no evidence, they plant some so they can convict him. Unfortunately, this gets exposed in court, and the officers who planted the evidence get sacked. Bob, meanwhile, gets Off on a Technicality and continues killing people.
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