ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of energy. This piece was initially revealed in Dispatches, a publication that spotlights wrongdoing across the nation. Sign up to obtain our tales in your inbox each week.
When Edgar Barrientos-Quintana left jail final November, he informed reporters: “Completely happy to be out right here. … It’s one of the best week. And extra to return.” It was an understated second from a person who had been in jail for near 16 years for a homicide that officers stated he didn’t commit. And it offered a stark distinction to the truth tv present that depicted the investigation that led to his arrest.
Barrientos-Quintana was freed after the Minnesota legal professional normal’s Conviction Overview Unit discovered he had been wrongfully convicted and beneficial vacating his conviction. The unit’s 180-page report cited failures by police, prosecutors and Barrientos-Quintana’s personal protection attorneys. Nevertheless it additionally talked about one thing reporter Jessica Lussenhop had by no means seen earlier than in a wrongful conviction case: the involvement of in style true crime present “The First 48.” The present begins every episode with the premise that the prospect of fixing a homicide is “lower in half” if police don’t have a major lead inside 48 hours of a killing — which additionally creates a way of deadline strain.
In two tales ProPublica just lately revealed, Lussenhop follows the present’s involvement within the murder investigation that landed Barrientos-Quintana in jail, and the way the present’s two-decade historical past of filming in cities throughout the U.S. has left a complicated trail of issues and municipal remorse.
I talked to Lussenhop about what she discovered about how “The First 48” operates and why so many cities have stopped working with the present.
What did you discover shocking whereas reporting this story?
Discovering out that these episodes usually air earlier than a defendant’s trial. The present has disclaimers to the impact of “everyone seems to be harmless till confirmed responsible,” however these phrases go by in a flash, and as a viewer, I definitely haven’t paid a lot consideration to them. This particular person remains to be harmless till confirmed responsible, however the present does a superb job of depicting them as responsible.
What else was shocking was simply the sheer variety of occasions there have been issues. There are exhibits like “Reside PD” which have had extraordinarily high-profile controversies and have been canceled. However “The First 48” has been on the air for 20 years, and a number of cities ended their relationships with the present. It’s not simply the protection bar that’s upset with it. It’s prosecutors, judges, mayors, metropolis council folks, all saying, “Why did our police division determine to do that?”
Why do police departments get entangled with this present?
So far as we perceive it, police departments don’t make any cash off this present, and when you keep in mind the lawsuits, generally the present winds up costing cities cash. Then the query turns into, properly, why would any police division agree to do that? I believe the reply is that police departments are sometimes the topic of damaging information protection. They need a light-weight shone on the work of their murder detectives and everybody who helps their investigations.
However one of many different necessary issues is these are sometimes the sorts of homicides that aren’t going to get quite a lot of press consideration. “The First 48” does usually interview the sufferer’s household; they’ll present the sufferer’s image on tv and say slightly bit about their lives. That could be far more media consideration than these victims would in any other case get. They’re usually poor, they’re usually folks of shade, and the sorts of homicides which will get little or no consideration of their native media. So I believe that it does, in a way, present a service.
How is that this much like and completely different from different wrongful conviction circumstances?
A variety of what’s in Barrientos-Quintana’s Conviction Overview Unit report are the hallmarks of wrongful convictions: very younger witnesses being interrogated for a really very long time, generally with out dad and mom or attorneys concerned; police not following picture lineup procedures; the protection claiming that the prosecution is withholding proof from them. However to our information, that is the primary exoneration ever to be tied to “The First 48.”
A number of folks, together with the Hennepin County prosecutor, informed me that the very premise of the present is extraordinarily problematic as a result of it makes it sound like it’s important to rush. The present has a literal clock that’s ticking down within the nook of the display screen. Clearly, you need good leads early on, however it’s important to preserve an open thoughts to proof that’s going to return into play in a while. One of many large items of proof in Barrientos-Quintana’s exoneration is the existence of surveillance tape of him at a grocery retailer with a lady roughly 33 minutes earlier than the taking pictures occurred. That was not a chunk of proof that that they had throughout the first 48 hours, and even throughout the first two weeks.
There’s additionally simply the notion that in case you have a digicam crew following you round, you’re going to behave in another way. Particularly if it’s a digicam crew for a present known as “The First 48,” which suggests you higher make one thing occur in 48 hours. That would impact your actions as an investigator.
What did you hear from the household of Jesse Mickelson, the sufferer Barrientos-Quintana was convicted of killing?
A number of family members have accepted that Barrientos-Quintana shouldn’t be responsible. These have been a few of the most fascinating conversations that I had. In case you spent 15 years not solely believing that he’s responsible however in a sure sense hating him for destroying your loved ones, and to be offered with new proof after which be like, “Wait a minute, I believe we obtained this unsuitable” — that simply takes quite a lot of braveness and coronary heart.
I spoke to Mickelson’s half-sister, Tina Rosebear. She considered the present as kind of a doc of this terrible expertise that her household had gone via, nevertheless it was one thing that acknowledged her brother’s life. She discovered it nearly a supply of consolation to observe the episode. However now she has very, very completely different emotions, and he or she attracts a brilliant line connecting the tv present to the truth that their household could by no means know who shot and killed Mickelson. Possibly these investigators didn’t do pretty much as good a job as they might have as a result of they have been dashing to satisfy this 48-hour factor. For quite a lot of causes, the chance to catch whoever did this has handed, and she will’t assist questioning if that’s in a roundabout way the present’s fault.
The businesses that produce the present didn’t reply to quite a few requests for remark or to an in depth record of questions. The detectives concerned within the case additionally declined to remark. One prosecutor within the unique case towards Barrientos-Quintana is now a decide and thus precluded from chatting with the press by the Minnesota Code of Judicial Conduct; one other took problem with most of the characterizations within the Conviction Overview Unit report however agreed that “The First 48” had been an issue.
