Crime Documentaries You Need To Watch

I’m a massive lover of conspiracy theories, crime shows and murder mysteries. Anything that freaks you out but keeps you intrigued, I’m into.

In fact, I’m into them so much, I’m considering starting a series for my blog. Maybe #freakyfridays? Who knows. If you actually want this to become a thing, let me know in the comments below because I for sure would love to write them.

Anyways, this post was actually highly suggested.

I’ve listed my recommendations for a good crime documentary or show:

Making a Murderer

If you own a netflix account and somehow haven’t come across this documentary, I am truly baffled.

Making a Murderer is a 10-part documentary series, filmed over the course of 10 years. First shown on Netflix in December of 2015. It trails the story of a man from Manitowoc County in Wisconsin. Steven Avery. In 1985, Avery was originally wrongfully imprisoned for the sexual assault and attempted murder of a woman, Penny Beernsten while jogging on a Lake Michigan beach. Though, after spending 18 years of a 32-year sentence, new DNA testing has surfaced which ascertained his innocence. And thus, he was exonerated and released from prison.

It was then two years later, after his release that Avery was re-arrested and charged with the murder of another woman, named Teresa Halbach. She was a photographer, where before disappearing, one of her last sightings was her taking photographs of a car at a salvage yard that Avery owned. A series of evidence lead to his conviction in 2007. Despite this, yet again Avery pleaded his innocence and claims that this was a set-up.

The series also goes onto highlight the arrest, prosecution and conviction of Avery’s young nephew, Brendan Dassey who was also charged in the murder. This was however largely done through intimidation and pressure, which can evidently be seen within the doc.

The documentary goes into riveting detail around the case, bringing light to the subject matters such as evidence tampering, prosecutorial transgression and coercion.

Interview with a Serial Killer

Seriously, this documentary will make you feel sick. It’s incredibly dark and somewhat disturbing. But if you’re into that like me, watch it.

It’s a graphically detailed interview with a serial killer who goes by the name of Arthur Shawcross, born in 1945 and died in 2008 whilst serving his life sentence. Throughout the interview he outright admits the murders of different women, and more troublingly how he killed these women. Unsurprisingly/surprisingly, he show’s absolutely no remorse nor any emotion whilst doing so. I kid you not, it will make you feel sick, disgusted and give you the biggest creeps ever.

He claims to have had a troubled childhood, which included behavioural difficulties, bullying, and different forms of abuse. His family had however confirmed that Shawcross was never abused within the home and his claims are in fact incorrect. The truth behind these claims were never actually confirmed but it did become apparent that Shawcross would alter and change his stories to the different investigators whom he had spoken to over time.

Despite his openness and willingness to talk about his crimes, he continues to avoid the questioning of the death of two young children. With the interviewer pushing his luck one final time near the end of the interview, Shawcross cuts it off and walks away; implying that he is done talking.

3096 Days (or titled, 3096 tage)

This isn’t a documentary, but it’s base on a real life case. It’s a film, which was originally on Netflix for some time but can now probably be found online (let’s be honest, you can find anything online now), invites us to a cinematic insight into the abuse, brutality and misery faced by Natascha Kampusch. It’s based on the factual case of Kampusch, an Austrian woman who was kidnapped at the age of 10 whilst she was on her way to school. The film unfolds her trauma into a gripping 111 minutes, following her as a young girl and into her adolescent years. She spent much of her formative years in captivity in the house of Wolfgang. It’s incredibly heartbreaking.

Case of JonBenet Ramsey

I have found this case insanely interesting after hearing about it. It’s super sketchy from the start and I’m planning to do a separate post on this case alone.

JonBenet Ramsey was a beautiful 6-year-old American child beauty pageant queen who was killed at her home in Boulder, Colorado in 1996. Her parents had woken up during the early hours of the morning to find a 3 paged ransom note addressed to her father, stating that they had her in their custody; and would remain unharmed as long as a sum of money was paid at a specific time. This alerted Mr and Mrs Ramsey, and they called the police who later arrived at the property. Following a search in their house around 8 hours after she was initially reported missing, John Ramsey, the father of JonBenet found her body in the basement of their house.

There is a two part documentary which you can find on youtube, covering specific details within the case, many of which will cause much speculation about what actually happened to lead to the death of JonBenet Ramsey and the validity and legitimacy of what the parents have said about it.

—–

These are just some documentaries which I highly recommend watching. As I’m always on the look for more and have seen many more, I’ll update this with a future post.

If you’ve seen any of these before, let me know what you think of them too!

Faye x