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(As I have stated on numerous occasions, HBO sets the standard for
fearless, groundbreaking documentaries of the sort that public
television supposedly was created to air.)
JOE BERLINGER AND BRUCE SINOFSKY IN COURT TODAY TO
WITNESS THE CONCLUSION
OF THEIR HBO DOCUMENTARY, PARADISE LOST
Filmmakers To Change Ending As Decision Is Handed-Down
Jason Baldwin, Damien Echols and Jessie Misskelly set free
Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory set to air on HBO January 2012
Jonesboro, Ark (August 19, 2011) –Critically acclaimed HBO
Documentary Paradise Lost filmmakers Joe Berlinger and Bruce
Sinofsky were in court today to witness the stunning conclusion in
which, after 18 years in prison, Jason Baldwin, Damien Echols and
Jessie Misskelly, known as the West Memphis Three, were set free.
The award-winning HBO documentary series Paradise Lost: The Child
Murders at Robin Hood Hills (1996) and Paradise Lost 2:
Revelations (2000) spawned a worldwide movement to free the West
Memphis Three for wrongful murder convictions. Set to debut on
HBO in January 2012, Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory will have its
theatrical premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival
with a number of prestigious festival dates to follow this Fall.
This film tells the entire story from the arrests in 1993 to the
growing movement, through the entire appeals process and the
uncovering of new evidence, concluding with their release.
As Damien Echols notes in the film, if not for the Paradise Lost
documentaries, “…these people would have murdered me, swept this
under the rug, and I wouldn't be anything but a memory right now."
On May 5, 1993, the bodies of three eight-year-old boys were found
next to a muddy creek in the wooded Robin Hood Hills area of West
Memphis, Arkansas. A month later, three teenagers, Jason Baldwin,
Damien Echols and Jessie Misskelly, were arrested, accused and
convicted of brutally raping, mutilating and killing the boys.
Fraught with innuendoes of devil worship, allegations of coerced
confessions and emotionally charged statements the case was one of
the most sensational in state history. The films sparked a
national debate regarding the innocence or guilt of the West
Memphis 3.
With the support of HBO, the filmmakers have stuck with the story
over an 18 year period making these compelling films in order to
continue to shed light, raise awareness and spur debate about the
events that transpired at that time and in subsequent years after
the convictions.
“Eighteen years and three films ago we started this journey to
document the terrible murders of three innocent boys and the
subsequent circus that followed the arrests and convictions of
Baldwin, Echols and Misskelly”, said Director and Producer Joe
Berlinger. “To see our work culminate in the righting of this
tragic miscarriage of justice is more than a filmmaker could ask
for. Added co-director Bruce Sinofsky: "Today, we along with HBO
are humbled to be a part of this remarkable outcome.”
Premiering at the 1996 Sundance Film Festival, Paradise Lost: The
Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills went on to win many accolades
after its HBO broadcast, including receiving Emmy and Peabody
Awards, a DGA nomination and was named Best Documentary by the
National Board of Review.
Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory is directed and produced by Joe
Berlinger. Co-directed and produced by Bruce Sinofsky. Edited by
Alyse Ardell Spiegel; Director of Photography Bob Richman and
producer/second unit director Jonathan Silberberg. Featuring songs
by Metallica. For HBO: supervising producer, Nancy Abraham;
executive producer, Sheila Nevins.
---
NY Times August 19, 2011
Deal Frees ‘West Memphis Three’ in Arkansas
By CAMPBELL ROBERTSON
JONESBORO, Ark. — Three men convicted of killing three 8-year-old
boys in a notorious 1993 murder case were freed from jail on
Friday, after a complicated legal maneuver that allowed them to
maintain their innocence while acknowledging that prosecutors had
enough evidence to convict them.
A district court judge declared that the three men — Damien W.
Echols, 36, Jason Baldwin, 34, and Jessie Misskelley Jr., 36,
known as the West Memphis Three — who have been in prison since
their arrest in 1993, had served the time for their crime. The
judge also levied a 10-year suspended sentence on each of the men.
With his release Friday, Mr. Echols became the highest-profile
death row inmate to be released in recent memory.
The agreement, known as an Alford plea, does not result in a full
exoneration; some of the convictions stand, though the men did not
admit guilt. The deal came five months before a scheduled hearing
was to held to determine whether the men should be granted a new
trial in light of DNA evidence that surfaced in the past few
years. None of their DNA has been found in tests of evidence at
the scene. The Arkansas Supreme Court ordered the new hearing in
November, giving new life to efforts to exonerate the three men.
In May 1993, the bodies of the boys, Christopher Byers, Steve
Branch and James Michael Moore, were found in a drainage ditch in
a wooded area of West Memphis, Ark., called Robin Hood Hills. The
bodies appeared to have been mutilated, their hands tied to their
feet.
The grotesque nature of the murders led to a theory about satanic
cult activity. Investigators focused their attention on Mr.
Echols, at the time a troubled yet gifted teenager who practiced
Wicca, a rarity in the town of West Memphis. Efforts to learn more
about him, spearheaded by a single mother cooperating with the
police, led to Mr. Misskelley, a passing acquaintance of Mr.
Echols, who is borderline mentally retarded.
After a nearly 12-hour interrogation by the police, Mr. Misskelley
confessed to the murders and implicated Mr. Echols and Mr.
Baldwin, though his confession diverged in significant details
with the facts of the crime known by the police.
Largely on the strength of that confession, Mr. Misskelley was
convicted in February 1994. Mr. Echols and Mr. Baldwin were
convicted soon after in a separate trial, largely on the testimony
of witnesses who said they heard the teenagers talk of the murders
and on the prosecution’s theory that the defendants had been
motivated as members of a satanic cult. Mr. Misskelley’s
confession was not admitted at their trial, though recently a
former lawyer for the jury foreman filed an affidavit saying that
the foreman, determined to convict, had brought the confession up
in deliberations to sway undecided jurors.
An award-winning documentary, “Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at
Robin Hood Hills,” was released after their convictions, bringing
them national attention. Benefit concerts were held, books were
written, a follow-up documentary was made and the men’s supporters
continued to pursue their freedom. Many residents of West Memphis
resented the presumption that outsiders knew the details of the
horrific case better than they did. But in recent years some,
though not all, of the victims’ families have begun to doubt the
guilt of the three men.
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