The unsolved murder of Beverly Lynn Smith (2022)
Compelling and horribly twisted real life tale.
My goodness!
I watch a lot of real life/true crime documentaries and only pen my thoughts on a fraction of these and this “Amazon Original” from 2022 deserves a few words of appreciation, as well as a scathing review yet again of the vaunted “Authorities” we misplace our trust in time, and time again.
A brief overview to bring you up to date:
In 1974, Beverly Lynn Smith was murdered, execution style, with a gunshot to the back of the head in her own home in Oshawa, Ontario, and after several investigations both immediately and throughout the remainder of the century, no killer or killers were caught or justice served. At the turn of the Millennium and under pressure from the still grieving family, the “cold case” was re-opened, a husband and ex-wife arrested, released and, after some horribly co-coercive police tactics, arrested once more and the husband charged with murder, only to be released five years later after the eventual murder trial collapsed under the weight of police ineptitude and now outlawed “sting” operations.
48 years since the grisly murder and now approaching 5 decades later, the killer or killers are still free and justice still to be served.
Split across four episodes entitled “The Catch”, “The Girl Next Door”, “Alibi” and “The Release”, my purpose isn’t to spoil this true-life tale but to briefly recommend this to you with the shocking revelations that the sting or “Mr Big” operations as they call them in Canada (or more plain and simply entrapment) shown in episode one is as scandalous as it obvious on first watch, and you may have the same reaction as me as to what a shower of bastards they are in policing and trapping a forced confession in such a way. This was obvious and odious. The reveal in the final chapter less so.
But just wait until you see chapter 3! This horribly chaotic tale ratchets up still further with phone tapping, friends turning on friends, an arguable inversion of religious teachings, the preying (and not praying) on the vulnerable, changing stories, coercion, pressure and desperation to solve the case in the only fashion required and desired of the local Police, lives changed forever, friendships and families driven apart, lives ruined and, entering chapter four, still no sign of justice or respite for a grieving family.
There’s a list as long as your arm of “people of interest” who refused to take part in the documentary, forced confessions, a reprehensible fake sting operation that borders on the farcical, the coercion of two mentally unstable and unfit people changing stories, failing “lie detector” tests and zero repercussions for a local Police who, nearly five decades on, have still failed to secure justice for the family grieving a daughter, sister, mother and wife.
If true crime or unsolved murders is your macabre bag of choice, this may fit the bill.
Thanks for reading. There’s a wealth and variation of articles contained within my archives so please do consider subscribing.