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True Crime Story: Indefensible: Stand Her Ground (2022)
Much disinformation was presented
Despite being against guns and against stand your ground laws the biased narrator has decided that M Alexander did nothing wrong and should have been let off. She claims that the reason why she was prosecuted is because she was black and a woman while Zimmerman was a privileged white so he was not.
First of all, Zimmerman was Hispanic and was prosecuted he was not able to use the stand your ground law to avoid a prosecution either. He was acquitted because a witness verified his account that Martin attacked him and was on top of him bashing his head into the ground and the jury found it credible that he believed Martin was trying to grab his gun so he used it before Martin could take it and use it on him.
Alexander was not convicted because she was a black woman and only men can use stand your ground laws. She was convicted because she had a history of domestic violence, had recently gotten out of jail for assault and her self-defense story was not believed by the jury. Her husband had a restraining order against her and she was not supposed to be at his house. She went there anyway and parked her car in his garage. They were arguing in the kitchen and he called her out for getting pregnant from someone else. She ran to her car, got a gun, returned to the kitchen and fired a shot next to him at the wall. He called the police and she was charged with aggravated assault with a firearm. She claimed that she went to the garage to leave but the door was stuck so she got a gun and then went back and used it to scare him because he was threatening her. Police tested the door and it worked so her account was false. Moreover, she could simply have left through another door instead of confronting him with a gun. The evidence supported that she used the gun because she was mad not because she felt he was going to attack her and she needed to shoot to get him away. Subsequently they briefly reconciled and he didn't want her to go to jail so he changed his story to support her account. But she assaulted him and was arrested again. After this assault he agreed to testify truthfully about the gun assault instead of lying to protect her.
To recap: she was in a house where she was not supposed to be in violation of a restraining order; she parked her car in the garage for some reason; they argued with one another; he didn't touch her physically during this argument; she had the ability to leave the house through any door but instead went to the garage to retrieve a gun from her vehicle; he didn't chase her there and she got the gun and went back to where he was and she fired a shot next to him; she claimed self defense because of prior times they had assaulted one another mutually made her scared he might assault her now; she claimed she was unable to leave in her car because the garage door was stuck but police proved this to be a lie. So it is a pretty open and shut case of assault not self-defense. Friedman seems to hate men and thus feels she should not have been punished for the shot. Friedman claims it is not fair that the stand your ground law didn't stop her from being prosecuted while she was trespassing in someone else's home. Who wants a law that bars prosecution in a situation where you go assault someone in their home? The law is meant to allow you to defend yourself in your own home. She attacks stand your ground laws falsely claiming they cause more gun violence and yet attacks Florida for not allowing Alexander to avoid prosecution by invoking it. The bias and distortion is simply ridiculous.
Dexter: New Blood (2021)
Slow progression and rushed lousy ending
Dexter had plenty of side action in between the main buildup. New Blood moves at a very slow pace and the side action is minimal, boring and very predictable. The ending is one of the worst endings of all times even surpassing the lousy ending of Dexter.
I will summarize the basics. Dexter has reformed and has not killed in years. He is dating the police chief in a sleepy town. He goes crazy and has a passion kill of a rich spoiled son and is very sloppy about it so the father finds out. The father happens to be a serial killer so is the main antagonist. Harrison is a teen and magically tracks Dexter down.
The serial killer stuffs his victims and keeps them on display in a subterranean bunker. While Dexter finds the chamber and victims the antagonist is busy burning down Dexter's cabin hoping he will run out so he can shoot Dexter. Dexter sees a trip wire and trips it to let the antagonist know he is in the bunker. The antagonist flees the fire to gather money and escape. Dexter catches him and kills him though and lets his son watch. His son is convinced he saves lives by killing murderers. Then they go back to his cabin and finds it burned down.
The police chief decides Dexter killed a junkie who ODd and has him arrested despite the only evidence of any kind being the man was injected with ketamine and Dexter had some. That would never hold up in court so Dexter had nothing to worry about. She also decides he is the Bay Harbor Butcher based on simply a hunch and despite no evidence at all has decided she is going to have him prosecuted for it. The fact she believes he is a killer based on nothing is a huge problem with the plot. But worse still, despite no evidence to actually convict Dexter he decides he has to escape to avoid the death penalty. He kills a cop to break jail instead of waiting and jumping bail at least. This totally goes against the whole Dexter nature but even worse there is no reason for it given the scant evidence against him.
Harrison meets him and shoots him then the police chief shows up and takes the gun and says she will take the blame for the shooting and tells Harrison to leave town.
It makes no sense to take the blame and yet send him away. The whole ending was rushed after a very slow progression and was not only anti-climactic but also made no sense. If he had to be killed off there were far better ways than to have Harrison do it and his girlfriend figuring out what Miami Metro could not based on no evidence was not the least bit interesting.
It didn't hold up to the Original series.
Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens (2015)
A bad remake of the Original
In many ways this is simply a remake of the original Star Wars trilogy except there was a desire to make the heroes black and female for liberals.
Remakes of classics are never good but this was done particularly poorly and instead of billing it as a remake so we would be prepared it is supposed to be a continuation.
Leah and Han's son Ben Solo is just like Anakin Skywalker he is trained as a Jedi and turns to the darkside becoming Kylo Ren, a poor ripoff of Darth Vader. Snoke plays the same role the Emperor did in the original. Luke feels horrible for losing him to the darkside and runs away to become a hermit where no one can find him taking up the role of Yoda essentially.
To placate liberals the traditional role of Luke is given to a female, Rey. The catch in the remake is that she is not trained by anyone and simply learns on her own how to use the force in a very short period of time. She is never trained at anything and yet is a master of all trades, she can fix or fly anything, and an expert with all weapons.
In the original film C3PO and R2D2 are being hunted down by the Empire because they have blueprints to the Deathstar which could enable the rebels to figure out how to destroy it. In this remake a droid has a map to the galaxy showing where Luke is and thus is being hunted down in hopes of killing Luke. The planet is a desert just like Luke's home planet. A rebel pilot trying to get the drone to take back to Leah is captured. He is freed by Finn a former stormtrooper who deserted and is trying to escape. Finn is essentially in the film just to be a token black protagonist. His character doesn't have much development or depth. Rey and Finn happen to find the Millennium Falcon in a junkyard and escape in it with the droid.
The successor to the Empire builds a deathstar that is bigger than ever- it is constructed out of a planet but is essentially the same thing just bigger and thus more powerful. It is called starkiller base because it sucks the power from stars till they are dead and uses such power to destroy anything it desires.
The Millennium Falcon is caught in a tractor beam just like it was in the original except this time it is not a Star Destroyer but rather a vessel commanded by Han. He decided to catch it because he wants his old ship back. His vessel is attacked and he uses the Falcon to escape.
The successor to the Empire attacks the New Republic and what remains scatters becoming just like the Rebels of old. They go to an old Rebel compound finding R2D2 and Rey finds Luke's old lightsaber. She is captured like Leah was.
The Falcon goes to where Leah is to bring the droid and tell what has transpired with the new deathstar. The map the droid has only shows the general location where Luke is not the surrounding area so they still can't figure out how to find him.
Finn stole plans and show that if they target a particular area the wepaon system will overload while is is sucking a star of its power and this could destroy the base but they need to find a way to knock the shields out first.
Conveniently the shields won't block anything that is traveling at light speed. Han decides to fly the Falcon through at lightspeed and then abruptly cut power and crash land on the planet. Then they will break into the base in a ripoff of Return of the Jedi's Endor scene except without the Ewoks. Leah tells Han to bring their boy back he is not beyond salvation.
Han, Finn, and Chewy crashland and break in. Rather than having them free Rey like happened with Leah Rey breaks out herself. She suddenly realizes she has the force with her and uses it to control the mind of a stormtrooper who she orders to free her and to give her his blaster. She kills numerous stormtroopers and winds up meeting up with the gang. They knock out the shields are are ready to escape and then Kylo Ren appears mimicking Luke when he faced Vader. Han goes up to him and tells him to leave the darkside and come with them. To change things up from the original Ren pulls out his light saber and kills Han. Chewy, Finn and Rey go to the Falcon but Ren is waiting for them. Finn has Luke's light saber and fights Ren but he is mauled. Then Rey takes the light saber and even though she never used one before she is better at it than Ren who was trained in its use and she kills him.
The rebels weaken the area causing a malfunction and the whole plant blows up like the death star did. Chewy, Ren and Finn escape back to Leah before it blows. The droid shows its map then R2D2 comes to life and provides the remainder of the map so now they can find Luke.
Rey goes to the planet and finds Luke and it ends with her holding out Luke's light saber for him to take. Clearly she will become a Jedi under his training in the next film. Since she already is the best at everything from marksmanship to light saber fighting and knows how to use her powers it begs the question why she even needs to train with Luke. This kind of garbage was in part what ruined the film.
All in all it was a huge let down.
Making a Murderer (2015)
Dishonest propaganda masquerading as an objective documentary
A fair documentary would detail the prosecution arguments, the defense arguments and detail in full the evidence used to convict and then honestly evaluate that evidence. Instead of clearly explaining all the evidence used to convict and the full arguments of both sides this series simply chose to post misleading evidence and arguments that suggest Avery is innocent and a victim of a miscarriage of justice.
Since the only way that Avery could be innocent is if the most extensive framing in all of US history was engaged in that is effectively what the defense argued in court. However the defense found nothing to substantiate these grandiose allegations. A great deal of deception is employed by the producers to give the false impression that the planting allegations of the defense are true and were substantiated. The producers intentionally chose not to reveal the full extent of evidence against Avery because the notion every bit of evidence was planted is absurd.
To try to pretend the police had a motive to plant evidence there was a great deal of deception built around Avery's civil rights lawsuit. Not a single thing was portrayed accurately about the lawsuit which actually had no legal leg to even stand on. The producers could not even be honest about the amount of the lawsuit. The demand was for an amount of at least $1 million and as much as $18 million, which Avery's lawyers arrived at by saying he could be entitled to up to $1 million for each year in prison. He was actually only in prison for 12 years as a result of the rape conviction that was vacated. The first 6 years he would have been in prison anyway for a different crime his sentences ran concurrently (served the same time). So even if by some miracle he got $1 million for each year in prison (which is unheard of) he still would have only received $12 million.
The county's insurance company defended the suit and settled it for $400,000. They settled it because it would have cost more in legal fees to settle the suit than to fight it. Even if there had been a judgment returned against Manitowoc it would have no impact on the police who handled the Halbach case. The series tries to give the false impression that they stood to personally lose which is nonsense.
The suit was settled in February 2006 before some of the evidence was even found. What evidence was found after? Well for one thing a bullet with Halbach's DNA that had been fired by Avery's rifle thus proving someone shot her in Avery's garage with Avery's rifle and the bullet either grazed her or exited her body. Who had access to Avery's rifle? Only him, no one else had a key to his trailer. The lawsuit was over at this point so the supposed motive of police to plant evidence at this point ceased to exist. That is likely why the series fails to discuss this evidence.
A number of times the documentary presents misleading evidence instead of the full story. For instance it suggests it is fact that pieces of Halbach's pelvic bone was found in the quarry. Left out is that burned animal bones were found in the quarry which is close to a hunting area. When looking through these animals bones the expert saw 2 small bone fragments that based on the shape could have been small pieces broken off of a human pelvis. But small bone fragments are not unique in shape, it could just as easily been fragments from an animal. The 2 pieces were tested and the tests failed to establish either was a piece of human bone. So it was simply an unproven suspicion that 2 bone fragments among the animal bone fragments were human. The documentary elevates this to fact omitting the part of the testimony that reveals the full story. This kind of deception is used throughout the series to try to fool viewers. The series alleges that this proved she was burned in the quarry and then her body was moved to Avery's burn pit. What the true evidence establishes is that Halbach was burned in Avery's burn pit and then at some point Avery shoveled some of the ashes from his pit into the burn barrels at his sister's house and in the process some bone fragments were shoveled into a barrel there. There were already animal bones int he barrel so perhaps he decided to hide them among those fragments. Whatever the reason this is the only movement of bones the evidence supports. The notion someone burned her in the quarry and moved all but 2 bone fragments to Avery's burn pit and put some in Barb's burn barrel as well for good measure is nonsense.
If you want to learn the true facts about the Halbach murder you will have to look somewhere else.
Don't Blink (2014)
A dead end street
The story is exceedingly simple. 10 friends go to a remote lodge, find the place deserted but signs that people had been there and simply vanished and one by one they all vanish. It is sort of like Blair Witch in that we never see them killed and never find out what happens to them.
Why don't they leave right away when they find everyone missing? Naturally the trip takes so long that no vehicle is capable of holding enough gas for a return trip. They have pumps at the lodge because of this but the pumps are empty of course. This already is strike 1 because what location is so remote that it is hundreds of miles from civilization? Strike 2 who would go to a resort that gets no cell phone or Internet reception?
They find a car abandoned and all the people missing know something is wrong but instead of pooling their gas resources so someone can leave to go try to get help they stay there. Their interaction and the dialogue is lame. Nothing they do makes any sense at all.
The only thing of any interest is that they vanish one by one. The only reason you keep watching is you want to find out what happened to the people who vanished before they got there and what is happening to them. But after you find out the temperature at the cabin is significantly warmer than the surrounding area and that all the animals and bugs are missing you realize it is supposedly some supernatural thing taking place around the cabin and you already lose interest.
Basically it is the kind of movie where you get bored of how slow and boring it is so you want to just fast forward to the end to find out what happened but if you do so you realize nothing is ever explained. Everyone vanishes without any explanation of how or why.
Good movies can be watched again and again. This movie you regret watching 1 time and certainly never want to watch again.
High Hopes: The Amityville Horror Murders (2014)
Unclear claims presented in disorganized manner resulting in a mess
Over the years Ron DeFeo has changed his account of the murders. In 1986 he blamed his mother and Dawn with the fiction of having been married at the time of the murders and living elsewhere; subsequently he blamed his sister Dawn alone; next he allegedly blamed Dawn and several friends and various documents were forged to support such contentions as referenced in the book The Night The DeFeos Died.
This documentary presents various lies from DeFeo as if they were reality. Some of the people are presented lying for him including Geraldine Gates (who he married in 1989 and divorced in 1993) and Mr. Nonnewitz. We are presented the bogus tale of DeFeo being with Geraldine on the night of the murders and being called back to the home to break up a fight between Dawn and their father. Never does the documentary bother to point out that DeFeo didn't even know Geraldine at this time and had spent the entire day at home. Similarly the documentary doesn't bother to mention that Nonnewitz's claim of Dawn asking to take him to Florida to visit Davidge is impossible since Davidge didn't move to Florida until after DeFeo was convicted. The tale of Dawn arguing with her father was entirely made up. The tales of how abusive Ronald DeFeo Sr were also largely made up and yet this was never told to the audience.
Instead of bothering to detail which claims are lies and fabrications and thus informing the audience fully of all relevant details the conclusion simply states DeFeo murdered his parents alone. Many of the misconceptions and lies presented are never cleared up thus it is not explained in detail how such was arrived at.
Worse yet, Katzenbach wants to pretend he found something no one else did so took a claim he admits is a lie- that Bobby Kelske used a revolver to shoot Louise DeFeo and he altered this to Defeo using a revolver to shoot her. He claims his theory is supported by the fact a portion of a top break revolver was recovered in the Canal by a search he commissioned. Too bad he cares more about his ego and falsely making a name for himself instead of the truth.
The truth is that 8 shots were fired, 8 shots hit the victims, 8 35 caliber rifle casings were recovered and all 8 casings had been fired by DeFeo's rifle. All bullets were consistent with being 35 caliber and having been fired by a 35 caliber Marlin rifle.
Katzenbach dishonestly suggests that one of the bullets that Louise was shot with was a 38 special. He announces that the weight and number of lands and grooves is consistent with a 38 special. He ignores that the weight he provided for the fragment (169 grains) is more than a complete 38 special bullet thus can't be a 38 special. How could a fragment of a bullet weigh more than the complete bullet? Worse yet, contrary to his claim that a fragment fired by a gun possessing more than 8 lands and grooves is consistent with a 38 special, it rules out such having been fired by a 38 special. At the time of the murders no 38 special in existence had more than 6 lands and grooves. The fact the murder weapon had more than 8 rules out 38 specials without even looking at anything else.
A further sign of Katzenbach's dishonesty is that he suggests the gun he found was the one he was searching for. The gun he was looking for was a blued snub nose 38 special. He specifically references DeFeo as having been alleged to own such a gun by Bobby Kelske and thus Katzenbach surmised it was used and tossed in the water and it was the gun he sought. The gun recovered was not a snub nose 38 special, it was not even a 38 special of any kind. In fact it was not even a complete gun. Someone stripped all useful parts including grips, the cylinder, barrel (parts that could be sold to someone because they could be used on a different frame) and the receiver that was left was chucked in the water. That is not consistent with his claim of Ron taking the gun and just tossing it in the water. But worse the gun recovered was an old top break revolver that there is no evidence at all to suggest the DeFeos ever owned. Instead of finding the model allegedly owned by Defeo that was being sought his divers found the receiver of an Iver Johnson Safety Hammer Automatic, third model (which stopped being made in 1941). This gun was offered in 3 calibers and since the barrel and cylinder were not present we don't know which of the 3 it was. We know it wasn't available in 38 special so can't have been a 38 special. Each time Katzenbach suggests it was he is lying. The gun he found would not even fit in the holster recovered from the Brooklyn sewer though this holster is another cited for a revolver being involved. The gun recover fired weaker, smaller bullets than a 38 special and had 5 lands and grooves (the 22 caliber version had 6 grooves). Thus there is no way it could have fired the 2nd bullet into Louise as Katzenbach claims. We know for sure it can't have fired it because the fragment was larger than a complete bullet fired by this gun plus the gun that fired the fragment had more than 8 lands and grooves while this gun had either 5 or 6.
Many smaller claims and issues presented in the documentary are also inaccurate and/or not clearly presented. This documentary largely propagates myth instead of dispatching them as it claimed would occur. Reading the book High Hopes is the best way to accurately learn about the Amityville case.
Shattered Hopes: The True Story of the Amityville Murders - Part II: Mob, Mayhem, Murder (2012)
Conspiracy theory proved wrong by its own evidence
The premise of this film is to give the impression that someone other than Ron DeFeo killed his family or he killed some of them but others participated as well. One of the claims aimed at establishing someone else helped him is the assertion more than 1 gun was used. Basically it is an extension of the claim made in the book "The Night The DeFeos Died". In that book the assertion is made that Bobby Kelske fired the second shot into Louise with a Colt Python. The producers seem to admit that 7 of the bullets were .35 caliber rifle rounds but insist one of the bullets in Louise was a .38 special.
DellaPenna identified this bullet at trial and in his report as a jacketed .35 rifle round like the other 7. His report asserts it was fired by a Marlin 336c rifle but he could not tie it definitively to Ron's Marlin rifle because it did not have enough incidental markings. At trial he testified it definitely was fired by Ron's rifle not just any Marlin 336C because the casing was matched to Ron's rifle. So he used both the casing and bullet to assert it was fired from Ron's rifle. The producers assert that DellaPenna misidentified the bullet. They cite hand notes he made detailing that the bullet has 8 lands and grooves remaining, weighs 169 grains and has a diameter of .363 then assertthese characteristics mean it is likely a .38 special. Apparently the producers didn't bother to consult a firearms expert because they seem to be under the impression that a .38 special round is larger than a .35 rifle round because the number 38 is bigger than 35. A .35 rifle round is longer than a .38 special, heavier and has a slightly larger diameter. A jacketed .35 rifle round weighs 200 grains while a jacketed .38 special round weighs 148 grains. The bullet in question is only a portion of the original bullet so the original bullet weighed more than 169 grains. How could it be a fragment from a .38 special round if a complete .38 special weighs less than this fragment? A portion of the bullet that brushed against the lands and grooves was missing. Hence why the notation stated only 8 L&G remain. This means that the gun tha fired the bullet had more than 8 L&G. There are no .38 specials that have more than 8 L&G and until the 1990s there were none that had more than 6. At the time of the murders every .38 Special in existence had either 5 or 6 lands and grooves. A gun with 5 or 6 L&G can't leave impressions indicating 8 L&G. So the supposed evidence meant to refute DellaPenna in fact supports his assessment and renders their assessment that it was a .38 special impossible. Mind you even if more than 1 gun had been used Ron still could have used both anyway. But the evidence proves all 6 were killed with the same rifle.
Documents allegedly created by Ron's first attorney are no more convincing. Allegedly Ron's lawyer found witnesses, took down notes and wanted their statements admitted into the record to use at trial. He didn't get affidavits from them but rather simply wrote down what they said to him, he typed it up and then supposedly was going to depose himself at trial. Statements can't be used at trial, you need to produce witnesses so that they can be cross examined. A lawyer cannot depose himself or give testimony so the entire convoluted tale is obviously nonsense. If any of these people actually said any of the things claimed they would have been subpoenaed to testify at trial. These documents conveniently appeared after the lawyer who supposedly wrote them was dead and could not deny writing them. They were not in the defense file handed over to Weber though nor in the Court record though it was alleged that a motion was filed in January 1975 to get them admitted. If that were the case there would be a record of the motion and copies of these documents would be in the court file. They are not in the file and no motion was filed in connection with them. It is pretty obvious that they were forged long after DeFeo's conviction.
The remainder of the conspiracy claims are founded upon innuendo and rank supposition no evidence at all. The quality of the film itself is like it was put together by high school students so you have bogus conspiracy claims that are presented in a manner not even amusing to watch.