My last post was about someone who has endorsed my forthcoming Privileged Killers book which probes how savvy wealthy or “gifted” people often get mere slaps on the wrist for heinous murders. The endorser, Elie Honig, a former Federal and State prosecutor and CNN legal analyst, authored his second book last year, Untouchable.

Untouchable

Honig shows how the rich and powerful use the justice system to their own benefit and rarely have to pay a price. Of course he writes about Trump and even explains his children dodged a fraud indictment.

Attorney Honig also explains how notorious figures like Jeffrey Epstein, Harvey Weinstein, and Bill Cosby successfully eluded justice for decades.

True Crime Story: Indefensible

Prior to Honig’s Untouchable, I recently discovered, was a Sundance TV series called True Crime Story: Indefensible. It’s been promoted with copy like:

“Small-town native and advocate Jena Friedman puts a spotlight on murder cases from small towns across America that demonstrate how crime impacts these tight-knit communities in unique and surprising ways.”

Here’s a slightly edited summary of an interview of the show’s host, Jena Friedman, by Liz Kocan Kocan is a popular culture writer living in Massachusetts. It appeared in Decider.

‘True Crime Story: Indefensible’ Host Jena Friedman Is Not Trying To Make True Crime Murderporn

Justice system Dysfunction

“Comedian Jena Friedman’s latest project, True Crime Story: Indefensible, explores true crime through the lens of our [messed up justice system… W]hile she herself is a passionate true crime fan, her show wants to take the genre a step further to explain how our system functions.

“The series, which premiered on SundanceTV and AMC+ on October 14, 2021 is hosted and co-executive produced by Friedman, who previously worked as a field producer on The Daily Show,…

Expert Witnesses

“The premiere episode, aptly titled ‘How Men Get Off,’ reveals the surprising and — now that I’ve seen it, disturbing — use of ‘expert witnesses’ in legal defenses, and how often they’re just professionals who are paid to say the right thing during a trial, resulting in not guilty verdicts or acquittals that don’t add up.

Indefensible doesn’t just report these injustices, on the show, Friedman interviews the witnesses, lawyers, officials and sometimes the victims to expose the flaws in the system, often resulting in savage takedowns of the very people she’s speaking with.

(In the first episode, she spoke with Dr. Martin Blinder, whose testimony in a murder case helped a man who all but admitted to killing his wife go free. In the testimony, Blinder painted the wife as a nag who withheld sex, and he told Friedman, ‘Sex was limited to two minutes on Saturday afternoons,’ to which Friedman responds, ‘Was the two minutes her fault?)’

We’ve seen this style of reporting before; The Daily Show’s field-reported segments turned it into an art form. Friedman’s background as a producer on that show, coupled with her quick wit, create the kind of uncomfortable moments that any good journalist can cull from a subject that deserves to be raked over the coals.

“’The injustices that we’re uncovering are just so egregious,’ Friedman explained to Decider when asked how she works up the nerve to interview her subjects, who stick to their defense, sometimes a little too smugly. ‘With the Blinder interview, you’re letting somebody reveal themselves in a way where I didn’t have to,’ she said.

“It feels wrong to call what Friedman is doing ‘gotcha’ journalism, but she does go to efforts to put her interview subjects on the defensive because what they’ve done or said in court has been so damaging to so many victims.

The “rough sex defense”

Episode 2 covers the “rough sex defense” phenomenon and features the story of a woman named Francisca Marquinez, a grandmother whose boyfriend – who admitted he choked her – was acquitted of her murder for claiming that, actually, she choked to death on his penis during oral sex.

Friedman explains that she often develops a rapport with the victim’s families, and wants to do them and their loved ones justice. ‘There’s an emotional element, you’re trying to advocate for them, so the interviews take on that level. It’s not nervousness, it’s anger and frustration that motivates a lot of the interviews.’”

‘There was a moment with Ken Padowitz [the defense attorney interviewed in episode 2] where I felt like I was too mean to him,’ she says, referring to the fact that Padowitz’s defense strategy involved depicting Marquinez as a woman who liked sex and sex toys. “It was when I said ‘Sorry, slut-shaming people is your job.’ And then I think back to Francisca and I think, ‘No, this is okay, I’m allowed to go there.’”

While the show aims to entertain, Friedman does hope it can effect change, too. The rough sex episode in particular was an important one for Friedman, and it was a topic she insisted they cover. ‘I really wanted to cover the rough sex defense. It has been outlawed in the U.K. but it still exists in the U.S. so there’s a legal framework to render that defense out of existence, and that to me was the sweet spot of, ‘Let’s find a case, let’s talk about it in a way that we activate people to care about it, and render it obsolete. No one consents to die during sex, despite what defense attorneys tell you.’” …

Empathy and advocacy

“What sets Indefensible apart from so many of the news and crime shows that are like it though, is Friedman’s empathy and advocacy for the victims and victims’ families that she interviews on the show. ‘These are real stories and real people and you want to honor them and do them justice.’ Earning the trust of the families was paramount to Friedman in order to accurately tell their stories, and she absorbed a lot of grief during her interview process. ‘We have to cut around a lot of my crying,’ she says. ‘I do not have a game face when talking to people who have had that much trauma.'”

Your thoughts

What’re your thoughts about a comedienne hosting a show that confronts criminal defense attorneys who often use questionable tactics to get their clients off?

If you’ve watched several episodes of Friedmans “Indefensible” show, do you think she does a good job interviewing crim justice players?

Other reactions to her sbow?

My latest book, PRIVILEGED KILLERS, is a true story about a half-dozen Dark Triad people in my everyday life - narcissists, manipulators, and psychopaths. Three of 'em murdered people, and one came after my wife and me. Print and e-book versions of this (and CLEFT HEART) available at Amazon and elsewhere online. Also at your local bookstore.

Jena Friedman’s on her ‘True Crime Story: Indefensible’ show.