General True Crime Shows

[Maizie131]

3 hours ago, AKraven said:

Regarding the JonBenet mystery:  How many respected criminalists, FBI profilers, etc., have been involved in this murder and yet it's still not resolved?  Yeah, I got it, lots of shit was compromised, but still.  Some smart son-of-a-bitch should figure this thing out, damn it!

Maybe I should get off of my fat ass and solve it myself, but I'm not that smart. 

Absolutely, AKraven!  Couldn't agree more.  (I'm referring to your comment that the case has never been solved -- NOT that you have a fat ass or you're not smart!  tee hee.)

[LexieLily]

Does anyone have thoughts on the Homicide Hunter last week, the three thirteen year olds playing with the gun and running around with it that ended up with one dead and the other two saying he committed suicide so they wouldn't get in trouble? One of the kids was charged with...something and got probation, and the other one never had formal charges filed against him.

What do you guys think?

[Maizie131]

3 hours ago, LexieLily said:

Does anyone have thoughts on the Homicide Hunter last week, the three thirteen year olds playing with the gun and running around with it that ended up with one dead and the other two saying he committed suicide so they wouldn't get in trouble? One of the kids was charged with...something and got probation, and the other one never had formal charges filed against him.

What do you guys think?

Lexie = I did happen to catch that episode, and I'm gonna have to agree w/Kenda that the outcome was appropriate for the circumstances.  It sure would be interesting to get an update on those 2 kids in about 5 years, though (or 5 years out from when it occurred).  What a tragedy!

BTW, Homicide Hunter has its own forum, under "H".  I just checked, and there hasn't been much traffic on it lately, which surprises me because there are a lot of Kenda lovers on this forum.

[auntjess]

I gave that one a miss.

[tobeannounced]

I am not looking forward to this forum becoming JonBenet Central tomorrow.  I'm kind of JonBenet'd out at the moment as far as discussing on the forums.  I wish they would have made one central place to discuss the case.  But make no mistake, I'll be watching ID's series - lol.  Actually now that I think about it, it might be nice to discuss it with my veteran true crime lovers.  These newbies to true crime make me crazy!

Edited September 11, 2016 by tobeannounced

[Minivanessa]

1 hour ago, tobeannounced said:

I am not looking forward to this forum becoming JonBenet Central tomorrow.  I'm kind of JonBenet'd out at the moment as far as discussing on the forums.  I wish they would have made one central place to discuss the case.  But make no mistake, I'll be watching ID's series - lol.  Actually now that I think about it, it might be nice to discuss it with my veteran true crime lovers.  These newbies to true crime make me crazy!

I just can't with any more about JonBenet. I live in the area (not Boulder itself), so we got the news before it hit as a national story. It was obvious to me from the get-go that the Boulder cops had ineffably fucked up the investigation from Moment One. If a family in the projects had reported a child missing and a kidnapping note found, the whole family would have been ordered out of the house ASAP, and taken down to the station for intensive separate interviews, while the cops were searching the home down to the last corner of the deepest closet. And if the kid were indeed dead in that home, the body would have been found then.

But the Ramseys were rich owners of a bigass house, and the cops IIRC sort of wandered around, with the family still in the house, found diddlysquat, and left. And only LATER did a "family friend" somehow come across JonBenet's body in the basement. And I'm not sure that even THEN the Boulder cops handled what was obviously a crime scene appropriately. 

I won't be watching the JonBenet shows, but I hope like hell that one of them presents all the reasons why this is probably a textbook case of What Not To Do for law enforcement.

Edited September 11, 2016 by Jeeves

[Brattinella]

10 minutes ago, Jeeves said:

the whole family would have been ordered out of the house ASAP, and taken down to the station for intensive separate interviews, while the cops were searching the home down to the last corner of the deepest closet. And if the kid were indeed dead in that home, the body would have been found then.

AND, they refused to be interviewed AT ALL.  They lawyered up immediately.  The cops gave them HUGE ridiculous leeway because a) they had lost a child (sigh) and b) they were fabulously rich.

[Minivanessa]

Just one thought after I re-read my post above. I can't remember if the note that JonBenet's mother found was an actual kidnapping note, as I called it, or something more ambiguous.

But even if it at first looked like a real kidnapping - and I'm not sure if it did -  IMO the Boulder cops didn't handle it correctly. At a minimum they did a piss poor job of searching the house. 

ETA: I'm no expert, but probably if a situation looks like a kidnapping the responding cops may not take the family away, but conduct the investigation more discreetly, i.e., within the home or somehow in a way to keep the police presence more on the down-low in case the house was being watched by the criminals. However, since the Ramseys lived in a huge house, there would have been plenty of room to conduct separate interviews of each family member without hauling them to the police station. 

Edited September 11, 2016 by Jeeves

[NewDigs]

4 hours ago, tobeannounced said:

I am not looking forward to this forum becoming JonBenet Central tomorrow.  I'm kind of JonBenet'd out at the moment as far as discussing on the forums.  I wish they would have made one central place to discuss the case.  But make no mistake, I'll be watching ID's series - lol.  Actually now that I think about it, it might be nice to discuss it with my veteran true crime lovers.  These newbies to true crime make me crazy!

There's actual an interesting Who killed JonBenet thread in the Dateline forum.

For either interest or avoidance. : )

[Court]

It was the FBI that let everyone in the house originally, not the Boulder police. Kidnappigs are FBI, it went to Boulder police once it was a homicide. The police still did a terrible job. 

Watch the FBI guy in the Dateline clip, I liked him for the most part. But his attitude about this bothered me. He was all peace, it's your jurisdiction now and you have a contaminated crime scene.

[tobeannounced]

Thanks, NewDigs.  I've posted in that forum and every other one.  That's why the JB overload and the wish that there was a central place to discuss it.  The same things keep getting rehashed.

[Court]

Just now, tobeannounced said:

Thanks, NewDigs.  I've posted in that forum and every other one.  That's why the JB overload and the wish that there was a central place to discuss it.  The same things keep getting rehashed.

I agree. It would be easier for me to keep up.

[Minivanessa]

Thanks for the info on the JB discussion. I hope everybody just goes there for the JB talk.

[auntjess]

Here's one that will probably be showing up.
 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/09/10/it-took-decades-to-identify-her-now-police-may-be-even-closer-to-finding-canadian-teens-killer/?hpid=hp_no-name_hp-in-the-news%3Apage%2Fin-the-news&utm_term=.f4e039eac462

[LexieLily]

The actress that played the victim on Killer Clergy this week had the worst wig or haircut I've ever seen.

Edited September 12, 2016 by LexieLily

[Maizie131]

On 9/4/2016 at 10:29 PM, AKraven said:

I claimed not to be a quitter, but damn!  That's young beauty queen overload.  I may not be able to commit to all of these shows unless there's nothing else interesting to watch.

Aw, c'mon, AKraven!  We need you to at least watch the one on I.D. tonight because we want to read your pithy comments!  Would you believe that I actually programmed my DVR to record frickin' Dr. Phil today @ 5?  Yeah...on purpose.  I don't think I've seen more than 2 or 3 of his shows since he's been on TV.  Anyhow, I'm interested to see the brother as an adult and how he comes across. 

[auntjess]

All I want, is to hear if it really is settled, and I guess that would be in the paper.
 

[SandyToes]

So I'm watching Deadline Crime with Tamron Hall. The ads claim she wants to know "Why."  Wish they would get into that!  The ep with the serial rapist in Pheonix was just on. Very similar case to those on Criminal Minds - the old days.  I was hoping they'd get into why the man started attacking women. Otherwise, this is just another "how they solved the crime" show. 

And I agree about wishing there was a single JonBenet thread. I'm dashing all over the place!

[Brattinella]

Truly.  I'd like to know the truth, but I'm not going to devote days and days of BS TV to (maybe) find the truth.

[TattleTeeny]

I am going to devote days and days of BS TV...knowing I will not find the truth. Oy vey.

Edited September 13, 2016 by TattleTeeny

[KellsBells]

On 9/12/2016 at 0:00 PM, AKraven said:

I'm with ya', but, hell, everybody and their damn brother in the media have jumped on this bandwagon.  

Yes, in fact Jon Benet's brother has even jumped on. I did not see his interview with Dr. Phil, but I saw excerpts on some morning show my hubby was watching. He looked creepily happy. Dr. Phil said he is "socially awkward." No kidding. I'm in the "not watching the show" camp, but let me know if they solve it. 

[editorgrrl]

On September 11, 2016 at 9:02 AM, tobeannounced said:

I am not looking forward to this forum becoming JonBenet Central.… Actually now that I think about it, it might be nice to discuss it with my veteran true crime lovers. These newbies to true crime make me crazy!

Each of the three episodes has its own thread in the Specials forum: http://forums.previously.tv/forum/937-specials-tv-movies-other-one-offs/

I'm glad JonBenet: An American Murder is bringing viewers and media attention to ID. They need it!

[tobeannounced]

Unfortunately it doesn't seem very well done.  I watched the first epi and kind of tuned it out when I realized it was gonna be an indictment of the parents.  I mean, all the handwriting experts who have never been able to say Patsy wrote the ransom note, and they find someone to say it's "highly likely" she wrote it.  Whatevs.  I couldn't even finish the second epi.

[millennium]

On 9/11/2016 at 9:02 AM, tobeannounced said:

I am not looking forward to this forum becoming JonBenet Central tomorrow.  I'm kind of JonBenet'd out at the moment as far as discussing on the forums.  I wish they would have made one central place to discuss the case.  But make no mistake, I'll be watching ID's series - lol.  Actually now that I think about it, it might be nice to discuss it with my veteran true crime lovers.  These newbies to true crime make me crazy!

Is it an Unpopular Opinion to say I never cared who killed Jon Benet?   Not then, not now.   Everything about the case is a turnoff, from the hateful mother to the wimpy father, to the Santa Claus guy, to the lead cop -- even the pretentious name Jon Benet irks me.   Sad the little girl was murdered, but not terribly surprising when you consider the whole kiddie beauty pageant freak show and the cast of characters.

Edited September 15, 2016 by millennium

[millennium]

8 hours ago, editorgrrl said:

Each of the three episodes has its own thread in the Specials forum: http://forums.previously.tv/forum/937-specials-tv-movies-other-one-offs/

I'm glad JonBenet: An American Murder is bringing viewers and media attention to ID. They need it!

What the network really needs are shows worth watching.   I am bored to death lately.    And sick of finding nothing on the schedule but repackaged Dateline shows and Cry Wolf.

[auntjess]

I watched a Forensic File, was in Texas, family returning from dinner out was gunned down, father survived despite bad injuries, one son not badly injured.

Circumstances very similar to a much done California (I think) case.  In both, surviving son is taken out to celebrate college graduation, though he has actually dropped out.
Said son hires friends to fire shot.
In Texas, father has a successful construction business, in California, it's to do with airplane sales or leasing.
My question is, are these really two different murders, did one inspire the other, or are they really two very similar murders?

 

[millennium]

This is the murder I want to see solved.   To the best of my knowledge, no Discovery ID show has touched it:

Hailey Dunn: Who killed 13 year old in 2010

Hailey's mother and the mother's live-in boyfriend (the last person to see Hailey alive) both failed lie detector tests relating to her disappearance.   Thousands of digital images of kidporn and bestiality were found in the home and in a related location.   Also found were some very creepy home-made slasher videos made by the mother and the boyfriend.

Hailey's remains were discovered in 2013, on the shore of a lake 20 miles from her home.

No one has ever been arrested.

Edited September 15, 2016 by millennium

[ridethemaverick]

So On the Case last week...two women and a man stabbed in the home of one of the women. The man lives, they die, cops don't believe his intruder story and it comes out that he was basically stalking the homeowner who was one of his employees. They could never get any physical evidence so he was never arrested.

Ten or so years later DNA and a jailhouse snitch prove that some other guy really did do it. But here's what gets me...the stalker guy was likely stalking her that night. All of their co-workers said the woman would have NEVER invited him over, and she had caught him sitting in front of her house before.

I was waiting for them to discuss this but they never did. I guess I can see why but I just thought it was interesting, and something I hadn't seen before. Creepy stalker gets stabbed because even creepier murderer shows up.

[ridethemaverick]

Also, I tried to watch the Jon Benet series but 3 minutes into the first one and I turned it off. A commentator said something like "they were the perfect family that all Americans wanted to be. They were wealthy, beautiful, and..." *click* 

I don't know why but that irked the crap out of me. Sure they were wealthy but beauty is subjective and they certainly werent anywhere near perfect and that's ok. I don't need to idolize victims to empathize to be invested in their story. 

[Akhna]

Quote

So I'm watching Deadline Crime with Tamron Hall. The ads claim she wants to know "Why."  Wish they would get into that!  The ep with the serial rapist in Pheonix was just on. Very similar case to those on Criminal Minds - the old days.  I was hoping they'd get into why the man started attacking women. Otherwise, this is just another "how they solved the crime" show.

This bugs me too. I think Chris Hansen says he wants to find out "Why" also but he doesn't seem to get into that. Guess he's too busy constantly clasping his hands in front of his chest or stroking his chin thoughtfully.

Quote

So On the Case last week...two women and a man stabbed in the home of one of the women. The man lives, they die, cops don't believe his intruder story and it comes out that he was basically stalking the homeowner who was one of his employees. They could never get any physical evidence so he was never arrested.

Ten or so years later DNA and a jailhouse snitch prove that some other guy really did do it. But here's what gets me...the stalker guy was likely stalking her that night. All of their co-workers said the woman would have NEVER invited him over, and she had caught him sitting in front of her house before.

I was waiting for them to discuss this but they never did. I guess I can see why but I just thought it was interesting, and something I hadn't seen before. Creepy stalker gets stabbed because even creepier murderer shows up.

I just watched this episode earlier today and wondered what would've happened if "creepier murderer" hadn't shown up. Creepy stalker was apparently so relieved that the real murderer had been caught but what was he planning to do that night? He was at the house of a woman who wanted nothing to do with him and had a woman staying with her who'd relocated, at least in part, to get away from him! So weird.

Also wanted to say I think Nightmare Next Door is a much better show now that they've quit with the jaunty music and lame puns. I always appreciated that they seem to cover cases that haven't been done a million times on other shows but it was always so jarring and sometimes inappropriate how they'd go from talking about the grisly details of a murder to , "Hey, in his spare time, Officer Smith loves riding motorcycles!"

Blood Relatives is my guilty pleasure show. Pretty trashy and silly in the presentation but I do like it. There was an episode a few weeks back where a kid's girlfriend turned out to be sleeping with his dad and got his name tattooed on her body! I don't even understand how that happens or who does that but I can't stop watching it.

*edit- Sorry my quote boxes aren't crediting the original posters, I must've screwed something up

Edited September 15, 2016 by Akhna

[Minivanessa]

8 hours ago, auntjess said:

I watched a Forensic File, was in Texas, family returning from dinner out was gunned down, father survived despite bad injuries, one son not badly injured.

Circumstances very similar to a much done California (I think) case.  In both, surviving son is taken out to celebrate college graduation, though he has actually dropped out.
Said son hires friends to fire shot.
In Texas, father has a successful construction business, in California, it's to do with airplane sales or leasing.
My question is, are these really two different murders, did one inspire the other, or are they really two very similar murders?

I think they're different although it's likely that Bart Whitaker (the son in Texas) knew of the Dana Ewell (California) case. 

There were, IMO, some differences between the cases. Dana Ewell hadn't been out to dinner with his family. His family (parents and sister) had spent the weekend at their beach house (or mountain cabin, I forget - anyway it was a second home) and were ambushed and killed on Sunday when they returned to their home. At the time, Dana Ewell was miles away, with his girlfriend and her family (and IIRC the girlfriend's dad was an FBI agent). Solid alibi for Dana.

As you said, @auntjess, Bart Whitaker had been out at dinner with his family (parents and brother), where they were celebrating Bart's upcoming college graduation. They were all ambushed - including Bart - when they returned home. Bart was not only present, he was shot (in the arm, I think), but much less seriously than the other three. His dad survived but his mother and brother died.

Maybe Bart figured that if he were present, and got shot, the cops wouldn't consider him a suspect. And in that respect he'd be smarter than Dana Ewell, who was a suspect long before law enforcement had enough evidence to arrest and charge him. Being apparently one of the victims was a clever idea on Bart's part.

Sadly, Bart W. made the same mistake Dana Ewell did - he "hired" a friend to do the shooting and the friend proved to be a weak link as the investigation wore on. Worse yet for Bart, (a) his dad survived, and (b) it was all too easy for the cops to discover that far from graduating from college, Bart had long since dropped out and had spent two or three years - and his parents' money - partying and playing when they thought he was away in college. 

You caught both sons' "big lies" though. In Dana's case, he was not lying about being in college. But. In a move that still has me shaking my head, as the Wikipedia article says, Dana's "father, Dale, who had built his airplane sales company from scratch, discovered that Dana was describing himself in the media as the successful owner of his father's company." Unbeknownst to Dana, his dad, who was worth nearly $8 million, "immediately increased Dana's age of inheritance from twenty-one to thirty-five." Dana didn't find that out until Dale's will was read.

Thanks for your post, @auntjess. I hadn't compared these two cases although I've seen plenty of shows about each of them. Now I also wonder how much Bart Whitaker took Dale Ewell's case into account when he planned his horrible deeds.

They are both scary guys and just as well for the rest of us they're behind bars. 

I think it's interesting that both guys were essentially foiled immediately in their plans to get their hands on their parents' wealth. In the Ewell case, Dana learned when his dad's will was read, that he wouldn't inherit until he was 35 years old. I think there was some kind of trust arrangement so Dana wasn't destitute, but he certainly couldn't live the lavish life I'm sure he'd intended. In the Whitaker case, the father survived so the kid inherited bupkus. Sometimes karma's not just a bitch, but a bitchslapping bitch. Heh.

[auntjess]

Thanks for the information, Jeeves.
Somehow, I'd never seen the Texas case before, though I'd seen the California one several times.

[auntjess]

6 hours ago, Akhna said:

This bugs me too. I think Chris Hansen says he wants to find out "Why"

It bugs me that he's taken the same line as Tamron Hall, and it looks like noticable copying, that someone in production should have picked up.
I have been liking the shows he's done.

[Court]

Chris Hansen's voice is so annoying. It sounds pretentious and too dramatic. I'd like the show better without him. I do like that I haven't been familiar with most of the cased he's covered.

[millennium]

12 hours ago, Court said:

Chris Hansen's voice is so annoying. It sounds pretentious and too dramatic. I'd like the show better without him. I do like that I haven't been familiar with most of the cased he's covered.

Chris Hansen was GREAT on To Catch a Predator ("Sit down, have a cookie ...")   Anything else just doesn't cut it for me.

Edited September 16, 2016 by millennium

[slensam]

The re-enactments on these shows so often suck its beyond belief. There was one show on last night where the "actor" had dark hair and a built physique and then the real person had gray hair and a beer gut.  And then one of the detectives looked like he should be in a boy band. They also love to build up to the final re-enactment of the murder with blood splatter flying everywhere. Frustrated horror movie directors. The one good thing about all the Jon Benet stuff is no silly unnecessarily ultra-violent re-enactments.

[auntjess]

I haven't been watching the JonBenet shows, but I've seen the promos.
Here's what bothers me.  They show the glamor, beauty pageant picture of her, and that's how she's remembered, but dammit, this was a real little girl who was murdered, not some Toddler in Tiara caricature.

[ButterQueen]

On August 29, 2016 at 7:39 PM, ButterQueen said:

 

Whoever decides the programming for this channel, stinks.  They show the same shows repeatedly in the same day and week.  It's ridiculous since they have so many shows to pick from.  

[Brattinella]

On 9/15/2016 at 8:51 AM, auntjess said:

It bugs me that he's taken the same line as Tamron Hall, and it looks like noticable copying, that someone in production should have picked up.
I have been liking the shows he's done.

To be fair, Chris Hansen has been a journalist since 1981.  Tamron Hall has been a journalist since 1992, but mostly since 2007, when NBC picked her up.   He definitely did not copy her.

[auntjess]

I know Hansen's been around, but who's show, using the tagline, was first?
I'm just going by the fact that I've seen her show longer.

[Brattinella]

I don't believe "Why" is a "tagline".  It is a valid investigate question, you know, who, what, why, when, where.  Chris Hansen covered Columbine while it was happening, OKC Bombing, Unabomber, and 9/11.  To Catch a Predator was a very successful show that exposed and caught pedophiles.  He is a very distinguished journalist.

Tamron Hall got her start by jumping up and down and clapping her hands on the Today show, giggling like a little girl.  The network folks liked it, plus she has a dead-sister.  Custom made for today's viewers.

No comparison.

[auntjess]

OK.  Haven't watched morning TV since Garroway and J Fred Muggs.
It the "I want to know why," that I think is a tagline that both use at the beginning of the shows.

[ButterQueen]

I don't like Tamron Hall.  Her interview questions are so soft ball.

Edited September 25, 2016 by ButterQueen

[Queena]

2 hours ago, Brattinella said:

I don't believe "Why" is a "tagline".  It is a valid investigate question, you know, who, what, why, when, where.  Chris Hansen covered Columbine while it was happening, OKC Bombing, Unabomber, and 9/11.  To Catch a Predator was a very successful show that exposed and caught pedophiles.  He is a very distinguished journalist.

Tamron Hall got her start by jumping up and down and clapping her hands on the Today show, giggling like a little girl.  The network folks liked it, plus she has a dead-sister.  Custom made for today's viewers.

No comparison.

She was on the Chicago Fox channel, anchoring the morning news. I think that she moved to MSNBC before going to the Today show. 

[TaraS1]

On 9/25/2016 at 11:37 AM, Brattinella said:

I don't believe "Why" is a "tagline".  It is a valid investigate question, you know, who, what, why, when, where.  Chris Hansen covered Columbine while it was happening, OKC Bombing, Unabomber, and 9/11.  To Catch a Predator was a very successful show that exposed and caught pedophiles.  He is a very distinguished journalist.

Tamron Hall got her start by jumping up and down and clapping her hands on the Today show, giggling like a little girl.  The network folks liked it, plus she has a dead-sister.  Custom made for today's viewers.

No comparison.

Thank you, Chris.

(I kid! I kid!)

[Brattinella]

18 minutes ago, TaraS1 said:

Thank you, Chris.

(I kid! I kid!)

Huh?  Did I miss something?

[TaraS1]

I was just joking that it sounded like Chris Hansen wrote that post himself lol.  Hope I didn't offend!

[Brattinella]

Ha!  I didn't even put in the part where he has won 7 Emmys and 4 Edward R Murrow awards, and a ton of others! 

[Jaded]

9 hours ago, AKraven said:

I'd like to see some more To Catch a Predator shows, they were interesting and satisfying.  Gawd, there are so many freaks out there, as we all know.

He does those segments on Crime Watch Daily they are called "Hansen Vs. Predator". It's only been about once a week so far though.

Edited September 28, 2016 by Jaded

[auntjess]

Peace!  In truth, I like Chris Hansen, and not only like Tamron Hall, but I love the name Tamron.