MOVIE: West of Memphis

West of Memphis:  an excellent documentary film about a failure in the criminal justice system.  The movie tells the story of three males who were teenagers when the incident took place and who spent 18 years in prison.  The title comes from the town where the incident happened,  West Memphis.  The year was 1993 and the incident was the murder of three young (8/9 yrs. old) boys whose bodies were found bound and drowned in a drainage ditch and had the appearance of having been mutilated.  The prosecutor labeled the boys’ death a Satanic Cult murder.  One of the three accused had confessed.  This particular individual, however, was mildly retarded and the confession had serious flaws.  All three teenagers were into heavy metal.  The movie is not a reenactment and, as such, you are not visually exposed to the violence; the descriptions, however, are enough.  The sentences handed down by the court were death for Damien Echols and life sentences for Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley, Jr.  All three men were released in 2011.  They had entered what is called an Alford guilty plea and got time served.  Translation:  the accused were allowed to maintain their innocence in the process of pleading guilty.  Such a plea gives the State immunity from a civil lawsuit.  The individuals just wanted their freedom.  The movie clearly sets forth their innocence, including the total lack of DNA evidence.  What little DNA evidence did exist points to the step-father of one of the deceased.  Despite the serious issues concerning evidence that existed from the beginning, it was only when the Arkansas Supreme Court ruled in 2010 that the lower court had to consider DNA evidence that the authorities began entertaining the release of the three men.  The movie also leaves you with the impression that if serious “Hollywood money” had not been invested in proving their innocence, the three men would still be in jail.  The celebrities who became involved include Johnny Depp, Eddie Vedder, Peter Jackson, the Dixie Chicks and Henry Rollins.  We are not told how much money was spent but it clearly exceed $1 million by a significant factor.  The 2 hour and 25 minute film was directed by Amy Berg who was also the co-writer.   It could have been edited a little more tightly.  The tragedy addressed in West Memphis is not limited to the fact that the real killer was never jailed and that people lost 18 years of their lives, but that the judicial system was so reticent to admit that an error had been made.  When you hear, for example, the true story on the “mutilation”, you wonder how this all could have occurred.  If some of this story sounds familiar it’s because a trilogy entitled Paradise Lost had been done while the three men were still in jail.  I’ve not watched the earlier films.