Brad Bohannon · Gypsy Rose Blanchard · Menudo
Plus: a true crime survey follow-up
the true crime that's worth your time
I wonder if Ryan Murphy is pleased or annoyed at the bounty of Menendez coverage this week. As noted Tuesday, Netflix announced that the prolific TV boss is plotting a season of his Monster franchise around the brothers. At roughly the same time, Roy Rossello, a former member of boy band Menudo, made headlines this week with allegations that Jose Menendez — the father of Erik and Lyle Menendez — sexually abused him when he as a child.
The claims are presented in Menendez + Menudo: Boys Betrayed, a three-part docuseries recently released on Peacock. That’s likely what I’ll watch to fulfill my true crime obligations this weekend; I am pretty sure it’s been out for a few days, though, so if anyone here has already watched and has thoughts, I’d love to hear.
The allegations in the doc have spurred attorney Mark Geragos to file papers Wednesday asking the court to vacate their convictions, LA news station ABC 7 reports. The new evidence in the docuseries “shows that Jose Menendez was very much a violent and brutal man who would sexually abuse children,” the Menendez defense team writes. “To resolve this case, jurors had to decide a single, critical question: was Jose Menendez molesting his sons? Jurors making this determination … did not know that Jose Menendez had previously raped a 14-year-old boy.”
In an interesting — if unsettling — bit of synergy, Geragos-owned news outlet Los Angeles Magazine trumpeted an “exclusive” this week that “corroborates allegations of sexual abuse the brothers have consistently said prompted the slayings.” The exclusive, it appears, is the same court filings reported on elsewhere, perhaps the “exclusive” bit is that the pub’s owner sent them to a LA Mag staffer first?
Setting aside the validity or lack thereof of the arguments presented, the optics here are not great. From the outside, it looks like Geragos is leveraging the once-reliable brand and masthead of LA Mag to help massage public perception of the case, which makes the Keith Raniere-sponsored content scheme I wrote about last fall look positively benign.
These new and late-breaking twists in the case have the potential to make Murphy’s Monster task a bit harder, but it also offers the opportunity to bring something new to the well-trod narrative. But with a name like Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story, Netflix had better be ready for a message or two from Geragos on that descriptor — or for a shitty review from a certain Los Angeles-based magazine. — EB
While we’re talking about items from earlier this week…Best Evidence contrib Dan Cassino is a lauded prof, researcher, and poll analyst; earlier this week I acknowledged that a silly, marketing-driven poll of those interested in true crime that I aggregated here would likely have him “barfing into a drawer.” But after the nausea passed, he very generously provided his analysis of the survey and its results, which were headlined “1 in 8 true crime fans think they can pull off a real bank heist.” From Dan:
I looked into the survey group doing the study, and, as you expected, it’s just a PR firm, almost certainly pulling respondents from online panels who have listed “true crime” as an interest in the past. Which is not a great way to do it, but has the virtue of being cheap (figure 2% of the population would fit the sample, and you’re looking at cost of maybe $3K). This got me thinking about (a) how I would actually carry out a rigorous survey of true crime aficionados, and (b) who I could get to pay me for doing so. I’d probably start with contact lists bought from the folks who do podcast ratings (Edison research, down the road), supplement with some contact lists from YouGov and such, and carry out the survey online to start, following up with texts for anyone we didn’t get via email. So, if anyone’s got $15K burning a hole in their pocket, and wants to find out what true crime fans really think, hit me up.
So, first, I know we’re heading into a recession, but surely someone in the business has $15K to kick to Dan to get some real answers on how folks who follow true crime actually think? If so, let us know, and we’ll connect you with Dan.
But, second, as you might recall I did a poll of my own that day, asking “Could you successfully pull off a bank heist?” Now, only 18 of you voted, so this is hardly representative of anything, but I’ll note that of those 18, two of you said you could. So, if anyone wants to write an “article” entitled “1 in 9 Best Evidence readers think they can pull off a real bank heist,” I’m happy to provide comment. — EB
If you opened this email as soon as you got it, you have less than nine hours left to pick May’s bonus review topic. Netflix’s Don’t Pick Up The Phone has a narrow lead over Who Killed Robert Wone? as I type, but your vote or votes (yes, you can choose more than one) could change all that.
If you thought that true crime survey nonsense was silly, you’re going to hate this one. But folks, it’s Friday, and I’m in a silly mood. That’s why I am linking to supermarket point-of-sale standby In Touch Weekly magazine, of all publications, which this week published a seemingly non-spell-checked piece that claims that The Act (among other properties) central figure Gypsy Rose Blanchard was the unwilling recipient of a “flirty email” from one-time Bachelorette contender Josh Seiter.
I don’t know anything about Seiter other than what appears in this article (apparently he is “best known for pursuing relationships with reality stars”); her response to his message ended up on his Instagram stories, so that doesn’t do much to debunk that “best known for” claim. Blanchard, who got married last year, is currently serving a 10-year prison sentence for her role in the 2015 slaying of her mother, Dee Dee Blanchard. — EB
I’m already looking forward to the 30 for 30 on this one. The news broke late Thursday: Per ESPN, University of Alabama baseball coach Brad Bohannon was fired by the “Crimson Tide” (not the submarine movie) school for his alleged role in a suspicious betting scheme.
It’s a story that’s been brewing since this time last week, when gaming regulators started noticing unusual activity at Ohio sportsbooks around the team’s game against LSU. Last Friday “an independent integrity monitor” issued an alert to betting establishments claiming "suspicious wagering activity,” and by Monday betting was halted in the state.
If, like me, you are not terribly familiar with how wagering on athletic events works, The Athletic’s coverage of the unfolding scandal is hugely useful in explaining how these red flags were raised:
U.S. Integrity contracts with sportsbooks, sports leagues and state regulators to track gaming transactions. U.S. Integrity president Matt Holt declined to reveal the amount of the bets placed, but he explained that his company monitors several factors that could generate a red flag. This includes an unusually large amount bet on a sport that doesn’t tend to draw wagers of that level and whether a bettor just opened an account or recently reactivated an account.
If a bet triggers a red flag in U.S. Integrity’s computer system or if a sportsbook operator reports suspicious activity, a U.S. Integrity employee investigates and issues an anonymized warning to state control boards and sportsbooks. In the case of the Alabama-LSU bets, this process happened “within minutes.”
In this case, surveillance video at a Cincinnati sportsbook suggested that someone who “was communicating with Bohannon at the time” placed large wagers on the game, both betting against Alabama. Then according to ESPN: “Alabama's scheduled starting pitcher, ace Luke Holman, was scratched before the LSU game because of back tightness and was replaced by sophomore Hagan Banks, who hadn't started since March 16. LSU won the game 8-6.”
The SEC (which regulates gambling in the U.S.) has released a statement that was basically a “yeah, we know, but we don’t have any comment right now,” and coverage has yet to elaborate on what, if any, criminal charges Bohannon might face. — EB
Monday on Best Evidence: Sarah apparently has a “dumb-or-venal?” file.
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