As I wrote and reported first, the West Memphis Three are coming to the New York Film Festival on Monday. They’re doing a day of press for HBO and then joining director Joe Berlinger for the premiere of “Paradise Lost: Purgatory.” Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky have been working on the West Memphis 3 story since 1996, and this is third film about them. A fourth film will follow that will tell the story of their release. The three men– Jason Baldwin, Damien Echols, Jessie Misskelley Jr –were released in August after 17 years in prison for crimes they didn’t commit. But because the crimes happened in Arkansas they were railroaded, subjected to a kangaroo court, local politics, and then made to admit their guilt so they could get out of jail. Baldwin accepted this agreement because Echols was on death row and would have been killed before a new trial could have absolved them all thanks to DNA evidence.
Here’s the original story in case Deadline Hollywood tries to snag it: http://www.showbiz411.com/2011/08/20/west-memphis-3-story-may-bring-released-defendants-to-new-york-film-festival
