Murderer?

A few nights ago, my son and I started watching a ten-episode series on Netflix called Making a Murderer. I was tired and fell asleep before the end of the second episode, but he continued watching until about three in the morning. It's quite compelling. I won't tell you what it's about exactly, but I will say that it involves a miscarriage of justice -- maybe more than one. I think one of the reasons people went along with what was going on is that this situation is like death: no one wants to think it can happen to them. Of course, it's a little different in that we're all going to die. As one of the lawyers said in the documentary, and I paraphrase, it may be true that any single one of us will never commit a crime, but it isn't necessarily true that we won't be accused of committing a crime.

I would say that some people lead lifestyles that make them more likely to be accused. Someone with a criminal background, even if it isn't of the same types of crime as the one at hand, would be more at risk than someone with no police record. But if you look at the number of exonerations that have been effected by groups like The Innocence Project, you'll see that a lot of people have spent a lot of years in prison for crimes they didn't commit -- despite being given a "fair trial". Our justice system seems to be more centered on "guilty until proven innocent" than the reverse. And authority figures are always given the benefit of the doubt, even when perhaps they should be doubted.

In the interest of not spoiling the program, I'll stop talking about it. But I highly recommend it. The program will really make you think, and it's done in a way that isn't didactic or sappy. After you watch, take a moment to look up the main players; there have been a few updates in the past month.