Similar to Ava DuVernay's When They See Us, Netflix's latest true-crime project, The Innocence Files, unravels the questionable methodologies and emotional fallouts behind wrongful convictions. The first two episodes of the docuseries cast serious doubt on how forensic dentistry was applied to two shockingly similar cases: the convictions of Levon Brooks and Kennedy Brewer. Both men were eventually exonerated - here's what you need to know about what happened to them and where they are today.
Both men spent over a decade behind bars for the rapes and murders of young girls in Noxubee County, Mississippi. In 1992, Brooks received a sentence to life for the death of Courtney Smith, his ex-girlfriend's daughter. In 1995, Brewer was put on death row for the murder of Christine Jackson, his girlfriend's daughter. The cases shared uncanny correlations - both victims were 3-year-old African-American girls who were kidnapped and sexually assaulted in the middle of the night,...
Both men spent over a decade behind bars for the rapes and murders of young girls in Noxubee County, Mississippi. In 1992, Brooks received a sentence to life for the death of Courtney Smith, his ex-girlfriend's daughter. In 1995, Brewer was put on death row for the murder of Christine Jackson, his girlfriend's daughter. The cases shared uncanny correlations - both victims were 3-year-old African-American girls who were kidnapped and sexually assaulted in the middle of the night,...
- 4/18/2020
- by Stacey Nguyen
- Popsugar.com
This The Innocence Files review contains no spoilers.
The Innocence Files opens with attorney Peter Neufeld explaining how The Innocence Project gets thousands of letters pleading for an attempt at new pleas. The “court of last resort” has exonerated nearly 200 wrongfully convicted prisoners since it was founded in 1992. The Innocence Project uses DNA to free the wrongfully-convicted and pushes for stronger science in the criminal justice system.
The goal of the project sets this apart from Netflix’s other justice projects, like Making a Murderer, The Keepers and Evil Genius: The True Story of America’s Most Diabolical Bank Heist. While the project is integral to the telling, it is the soul of the story, the documentary focuses on the cases. The episodes present the cases in three phases. After the crime itself is established, they sift through The Evidence, The Witness and The Prosecution. Then they tear apart what is fundamentally wrong in each phase.
The Innocence Files opens with attorney Peter Neufeld explaining how The Innocence Project gets thousands of letters pleading for an attempt at new pleas. The “court of last resort” has exonerated nearly 200 wrongfully convicted prisoners since it was founded in 1992. The Innocence Project uses DNA to free the wrongfully-convicted and pushes for stronger science in the criminal justice system.
The goal of the project sets this apart from Netflix’s other justice projects, like Making a Murderer, The Keepers and Evil Genius: The True Story of America’s Most Diabolical Bank Heist. While the project is integral to the telling, it is the soul of the story, the documentary focuses on the cases. The episodes present the cases in three phases. After the crime itself is established, they sift through The Evidence, The Witness and The Prosecution. Then they tear apart what is fundamentally wrong in each phase.
- 4/15/2020
- by Alec Bojalad
- Den of Geek
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