New 8-part Documentary Series from Academy Award-Nominated Filmmaker Asks Whether Justice is Being Served in America
Find Al Jazeera America near you: Al Jazeera America
NEW YORK, NY –“The System with Joe Berlinger,” an original documentary series premiering Sunday, May 18 at 9 PM ET/6 PT on Al Jazeera America, explores controversial cases across the farthest reaches of the American justice system, asking whether justice is being served.
In this eight-part series, acclaimed filmmaker Joe Berlinger guides the audience through a hard look at some of the most pressing issues plaguing the system: flawed forensics, faulty eyewitness testimony, juvenile justice, mandatory minimum sentencing and more.
Al Jazeera America’s documentary unit brings critically-acclaimed, long-form storytelling to audiences on Sunday evenings as part of the “Al Jazeera America Presents” strand. Most recently, the channel aired “Borderland,” a four-part documentary series that follows ordinary Americans confronting the realities of illegal immigration.
On Sunday, May 18th, “The System with Joe Berlinger” begins by looking at false confessions. There are a total of 1,304 exonerations listed in The National Registry of Exonerations; nearly half of the individuals exonerated had spent a minimum of 8 years in prison. Twenty-eight percent (28%) were cleared in part with the help of DNA evidence, and in almost two-thirds (62%) of the cases that are overturned by DNA evidence, the defendant gave a false statement.
We meet Nevada’s Kirstin “Blaise” Lobato, who has twice been convicted for the brutal murder and sexual mutilation of a homeless man in Las Vegas…without any physical evidence tying her to the scene. And, she says she never confessed to the crime –instead, she admitted to stabbing a man in self-defense after he attempted to rape her. We follow Lobato’s legal defense team as they try to convince the Clark County DA to examine DNA evidence that was collected, but never tested.
In New York, we meet Jeffrey Deskovic, who was arrested for the brutal rape and slaying of a high school classmate in Peekskill, NY. Police officers subjected the 16-year-old to seven hours of withering interrogation, and after confessing he eventually spent 16 years in prison begging prosecutors to test DNA evidence, during which time he contemplated suicide. When new Westchester County DA Janet DiFiore was elected, she decided to test a semen sample taken from the victim’s body and found it matched another inmate, Steven Cunningham. In 2006, Deskovic was released and now works to help the wrongfully convicted through the Jeffrey Deskovic Foundation for Justice.
On Sunday, May 25th at 9pm ET, “The System with Joe Berlinger” examines mandatory minimum sentencing and the effect these laws have had on various families. In Florida, 58-year-old Orville Lee Wollard is serving 20 years after being found guilty for aggravated assault in 2009. He maintains he was firing a warning shot at the belligerent boyfriend of his youngest daughter, Sarah Wollard, who was 16 years old at the time. Because Wollard considered himself innocent, he rejected a plea bargain for no jail time and five years’ probation. Instead, he went to trial, was found guilty and had to serve the legislated mandate of 20 years under the controversial 10-20-Life statute.
The episode also focuses on the rampant gun violence in Chicago and an effort by law enforcement, the mayor and legislators to instate a tougher mandatory minimum gun bill that would increase prison sentences for certain gun crimes like possession of an illegal firearm. The episode highlights two different gun crimes that might have been prevented had this mandatory minimum gun law been in effect: the case of 16-year-old Hadiya Pendleton who was murdered by a gang member and 4-year-old Deonta Howard who was shot in the face. Both men accused of these crimes had prior gun charges and received little or no jail time. In 2013, Chicago’s homicide rate was 15 per 100,000 people — nearly four time New York City’s current rate. The city’s gunshot victimization rate, including nonfatal and fatal, is 62.1 per 100,000 people. Within that rate, black males are victims at a rate of 1 in 200.
In the show, we meet opponents of the mandatory sentencing bill, including Co-Leader of the Black Caucus State Representative Ken Dunkin, who believes mandatory minimums are an ineffective, expensive, antiquated method which traps people inside prison, forces people to plea, and clogs jails. Ultimately, the bill was postponed due to parliamentary requests for various reports by Ken Dunkin. In November 2013, a contingent of black lawmakers, led by Ken Dunkin, blocked a vote on Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s bill, sponsored by Rep. Mike Zalewski, to impose tougher penalties for illegal gun possession.
On Sunday, June 1st at 9pm ET, “The System with Joe Berlinger” looks at an FBI scandal involving manipulated forensic evidence that goes back over 30 years and may have had a profound impact of literally thousands of cases. In Baltimore, we meet John Huffington, who spent 32 years in prison after he was convicted of brutally murdering a couple in a drug-fueled rage in 1981. Last summer he walked free after DNA testing proved that the hair evidence used to convict him was not his hair.
We also meet Willie Manning, sentenced to death in 1992 for the murder of two college students in Starkville, Mississippi using similar evidence. Last year, just hours before Manning was scheduled to die, the court stayed his execution after the FBI admitted that the forensic evidence used to convict him was flawed. Viewers uncover troubling information about how forensic analysis is used in America’s courtrooms. Do common specialties such as bite mark matching, handwriting analysis and burn pattern analysis have real scientific merit? Are the roles of hair fiber analysis, carpet fiber analysis, blood spatter pattern analysis and other investigative tools routinely overstated in court?
Five more episodes of “The System with Joe Berlinger” will explore mistaken eyewitness identification, issues with juvenile sentencing, stop-and-frisk and other policing strategies, the changing face of parole and prosecutorial misconduct.
“The System with Joe Berlinger” is directed and executive produced by Joe Berlinger and RadicalMedia for Al Jazeera America.
To learn more about the film, visit: The System
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