Jason Cramer

Jason Cramer is a fictional character on the HBO drama "Oz" played by Robert Bogue.

Character overview

"Prisoner #98C931. Convicted September 6, 1998 - Murder in the first degree, Kidnapping, Assault with a dangerous instrument. Sentence: Life imprisonment without parole. Granted a new trial in 2000, and found not guilty, subsequently released from OZ."

Jason Cramer is serving a sentence for decapitating his male lover. In Oz, he represents the Gays in the boxing tournament and remains in Oz until a woman who was a juror at his trial delivers him information about a homophobic jury member. With the help of Kareem Said, he gets a new trial and is ultimately freed from Oz.

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Cramer arrives in Oz and represents the Gays in the Boxing tournament. Cramer is a relatively skilled Boxer but the odds are stacked against him in the ring as none of the inmates believe a homosexual can be a good fighter. His first fight is against the Latinos represented by Miguel Alvarez. Ryan O'Reilly, an Irish inmate who secretly has been fixing the fights, tells Cramer that the Latinos have planned to rape his lover if he is to indeed lose the fight. Angrily, he beats Alvarez in the fight not knowing that O'Reilly fixed the fight by drugging Alvarez's water. As O'Reilly was the only one who bet on Cramer, many inmates question O'Reilly being on the winning end of every fight. Cramer's victory gives him a match in the semi-finals and causes the majority of the inmates to insult the Latinos for losing to a gay inmate. Cramer is going to face black inmate Hamid Khan as the racial tension within Oz intensifies. Vern Schillinger urges Cramer to win and he gets support during the fight from most of the White inmates who are only interested in seeing Khan lose. Khan and Cramer fight three solid rounds with a racially divided crowd and at the end of the fight, Khan only wins by a 2-1 vote as neither fighter is knocked out. After the fight, the tension within Oz gets worse and the prison is ultimately locked down.

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When the lockdown is ended, Cramer is approached by a female juror at his trial who states that a jury member was prejudiced against him for being gay. She thinks he is guilty, but informs him of this as she could not live with having him having gone to prison on the basis of his sexual orientation. He convinces Muslim inmate Kareem Said to help him get a new trial, and Said puts aside his moral views about homosexuality as a means of having Cramer receive justice. The judge grants a new trial and then Cramer is given more information from the homicide detective who arrested him.

Detective Robert Stransky is dying of emphysema and wishes to clear his conscience before he dies. Stransky knows Cramer was guilty but confesses that he fabricated the evidence, getting a kitchen knife that a friend in Forensics helped him doctor the fingerprints onto. As this development occurs, Said sees that Cramer could go free altogether. Said is opposed to this because he figured Cramer was indeed guilty of murder but needed to be tried and found guilty for his crime, not his sexual orientation. As a result, Said recuses himself as Cramer's attorney. It is too late, however, as Cramer gets tried again and is found not guilty. Cramer thus becomes one of the few inmates during the series run to actually be released from the prison: the vast majority of inmate characters who were "written out" of the show exited via an on-screen death, usually at the hands of a fellow inmate.

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