For those of you who think that the media convicted Pamela Smart, I was just reminded about another case in California that had media coverage and movies and books that were released. Leslie Van Houten, a follower of Charles Manson was convicted in the 1970s of two murders. During her original trial, her first attorney disappeared. Even so, she was convicted and sentenced to death, it was commuted to life after the death penalty was found to be unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. In 1977, she was granted a retrial, and also had a second retrial. After the second one she was found guilty and sentenced again to life imprisonment. There was a movie that was released in 1976, and a book before that called Helter Skelter. There was also a book called The Family that was definitely out in 1977. I recall seeing it that year translated into Hebrew. Even in the book, Helter Skelter, Bugliosi wrote that he had very little hard evidence against Van Houten and mostly the word of a couple of people. Even with all those out there, Van Houten was again convicted on witness testimony and the evidence that was had, not because of a movie that had been shown on tv that was based on the investigation. The movie identifies her by name and makes a solid case that Van Houten murdered those people.
I was reading about the Documentary of Pamela Smart, and she is not happy that Nicole Kidman didn't talk to her before making the movie. Smart isn't unhappy with the movie, just that the actress didn't talk with her about the character.
