The minister responsible for legal protection, Frank Weerwind, explained on Sunday evening Eus’ book club about his favorite book, Bint from Bordeaux. Beautifully written, he said, and a beautiful premise; someone becomes a victim of the system he invented himself. In Bint a headmaster succumbs to his own reign of terror.
I hope that Weatherwind to later in the evening Argos Media Logic (VPRO) has looked. It was about true crime, true crime stories in series, podcasts and films. Sometimes something goes wrong. Sometimes just bringing up a case is painful. Families of three Dutch victims previously objected Murder file from Net5. Their story as “entertainment” on TV had “emotional impact,” they said. Two of the three episodes were still aired. Last week, the main character demanded a ban on broadcasting the series in court over his case, An American nightmare. Jaitsen Singh has spent 56 years in a US prison for the murder of his wife and stepdaughter. The makers started the documentary on the assumption that Singh was innocently imprisoned, but gradually came to the conclusion that he may have been guilty of more than expected. The series may still be broadcast, Monday on NPO Plus, next week on NPO2.
The innocent perpetrator or the guilty victim. Wonderful data, but not if you make mistakes. In ‘the Deventer murder case’ the television maker was sure that the convicted bookkeeper had not done it, but later he thought he had. In the ‘Lazy Duck murder’, John van den Heuvel was both certain that the husband had and had not killed his wife. Well, it is up to that point if you say that this perpetrator cannot have done it. But what if the program maker starts thinking about who could have done it. That’s what ‘The character assassination’ was about Media logic. The program focused on the series The villa murder from KRO-NCRV.
Error of justice
During a robbery at an Arnhem villa, the 63-year-old resident was shot dead, a 33-year-old friend who was visiting was injured. Nine men were convicted. Wrongly so, scientists from the Reasonable Doubt Project concluded. In 2014 they wrote a book about the miscarriage of justice in this case. Excellent book, said emeritus professor of legal psychology Peter van Koppen at the time to the makers of the series, and now again to Media logic. But the last chapter, that’s where it went wrong. The suggestion is made that the injured girlfriend, Eline Visser, is not a victim but a perpetrator. The book is being withdrawn from sale.
In the latest episode of The villa murder goes wrong too. Two bullets were fired that night. But, say the makers, was Eline Visser really hit? How bad were her injuries? The forensic research couple Eikelenboom is instructed to investigate whether Visser could have been hit. Viewers already knew enough then. Visser did it, they tweeted, most of them also had an appropriate (death) penalty in mind. According to Peter van Koppen, the documentary makers mainly made a reconstruction of their own fantasy. “So much nonsense is being sold here, even as a journalist you have to see that.” Oof.
Media logic enlists a forensic weapons expert to question the series’ raised doubt. And, very strongly, they visit the ER doctor who treated Eline Visser that evening. He saw a bloodied woman in shock, with her friend’s brain tissue in her curls.
Somehow I hoped so Media logic would be more damning about journalists who imagine themselves to be detectives and judges and make a mess of it. But judging is up to the viewer.