Beyond a shadow of a doubt is a concept in a legal setting, that is, a courtroom.

It is a standard by which a jury decides whether someone has committed a crime.

It is a very high standard, and applies only to cases with severe penalties, such as murder cases.

It means the jury must make a decision without any doubt in it at all. If there is a reasonable alternative, the standard is not met.

For instance, in the case of a simple robbery in which there was no harm to anyone or threat to anyone, the jury would have a lesser standard to judge whether the defendant was innocent or guilty.

Note that in the OJ Simpson case, he was found innocent of the murder of his wife Nicole in the murder trial. Here the jury had to use this high standard of “beyond a shadow of a doubt.”

But when je was tried essentially for the same crime in a civil trial, he was found guilty. (The standard of proof was less than “beyond a shadow of a doubt.” There could be more doubt in the minds of the jury. Therefore he WAS found guilty. CRIMINAL trials and CIVIL trials will use different standards to determine guilt and innocense.