| In the Dark | |
| Host: | Madeleine Baran |
| Updates: | Weekly |
| Language: | English |
| Theme Music Composer: | Gary Meister |
| Audio Format: | Podcast (via streaming or downloadable MP3) |
| Num Seasons: | 3 (plus 2 limited-run special reports) |
| Num Episodes: | 46 |
| Began: | September 7, 2016 |
| Provider: | American Public Media (2016–2022) The New Yorker (2023–present) |
| Cited For: | Peabody Award (2017, 2020) |
| Cited As: | "Transcending the [crime story] genre and advancing its scope of possibility" (2017) "Offering a master class in true-crime podcasting and in journalism that matters" (2020) |
In the Dark is an investigative journalism podcast hosted by Madeleine Baran, and produced by Samara Freemark, The New Yorker, and Condé Nast Entertainment. The series launched in September 2016 at American Public Media (APM), featuring in-depth reportage from APM's investigative reporting and documentary unit, APM Reports.[1] Two full seasons were produced, each focusing on a high-profile case and the actions and conduct in the policing or prosecuting of those cases—the kidnapping/murder of Jacob Wetterling (Season 1) and the quadruple homicide case for which Curtis Flowers was tried 6 times (Season 2). A subsequent "Special Report" series, released in spring 2020,[2] reported on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in the Mississippi Delta.[3] [4] The series was cancelled in May 2022 as part of APM's dissolving of APM Reports and "incorporating select programming elements" from the unit into its MPR News operation.[5] [6]
In March 2023, The New Yorker acquired the In the Dark library, and its team joined the magazine's staff to continue producing and distributing new episodes.[7] A four-episode miniseries titled "The Runaway Princesses," about the attempted escape of Emirati princess Latifa bint Mohammed Al Maktoum, based on reporting from Heidi Blake, was released in January 2024.[8] The series' third season, which examined the 2005 Haditha killings conducted by U.S. Marines, began releasing episodes in July 2024.[9]
In the Darks hallmark is focusing not so much on a crime itself, but more on the behavior of law enforcement and prosecutors in their investigation of those crimes, as well as how such behavior affected the accused and their families, the victims' families, and surrounding communities. In discussing the show's first season with Esquire in November 2016, host/lead reporter Madeleine Baran noted that the APM team's "clear line of reporting" (her term) focused less on who kidnapped and murdered Jacob Wetterling, and instead more on how and why the crime went so long without resolution and the resulting impact. In comparison to other true crime podcasts (e.g. Serial) that attempt to investigate a crime, Baran told Esquire that the In the Dark was "not a mystery novel" and that APM Reports did not set out to play detective and solve the case, stating that "we saw ourselves as investigating the investigation."
The inspiration for In the Darks title came from not only the time when Wetterling was kidnapped (just after 9:00 p.m. CDT on October 22, 1989) but also the lack of transparency by the Stearns County, Minnesota, Sheriff's Department in the case. As Baran put it to MPR News, "There's this crime that happened in the dark and, also, there's this investigation that happened in the dark."[1]
Season 1 of In the Dark explored the case of Jacob Wetterling, an 11-year-old boy from St. Joseph, Minnesota who was kidnapped and murdered on the night of October 22, 1989. Wetterling's case went unsolved for 27 years until his remains were discovered in a pasture near Paynesville, Minnesota on September 1, 2016. The location was revealed by Danny Heinrich, a long-time person of interest in the abduction of another boy, Jared Scheierl, in the nearby town of Cold Spring. On September 6, 2016, Heinrich admitted to kidnapping and murdering Wetterling as well as the abduction and sexual assault of Scheierl.[10] Heinrich was sentenced on November 21, 2016, to a 20-year prison term for a federal child pornography charge.[11]
Production on Season 1 had been underway for 9 months and was in its final stages (it was scheduled to premiere on September 13, 2016) by the time Wetterling's remains were discovered and Heinrich confessed to the crime. The developments, which host/lead reporter Madeleine Baran and the APM Reports team were not expecting ahead of time,[12] prompted them to re-edit and re-record the first two episodes (at least the first of which was already finished) and move up their release to September 7, one day after Heinrich's court appearance.[13]
The edits to the first two episodes of In the Dark turned out to be minimal, for by then, the reporting team's focus wasn't so much about who may have been responsible for Jacob Wetterling's disappearance but more about the investigation of the crime and its effects on the community. The team focused on systemic failures in the Wetterling investigation, in particular how the Stearns County Sheriff's Office handled not only the case but other similar cases.
In addition to examining the actions of the Stearns County Sheriff's Office, broader repercussions of the Wetterling case were also explored, including the impact on Jacob's family and friends (Jacob's parents, Jerry and Patty Wetterling, were extensively featured); its effect on the immediate Stearns County area; and national implications, including the establishment of a federal law, named in Jacob's honor, that requires states to implement and contribute to registries that track sex offenders and crimes against children.
As indicated above, the release dates of In the Darks first two episodes were initially scheduled for a September 13, 2016, release date. The developments that led to Danny Heinrich's confession in the Jacob Wetterling case prompted APM to re-record those episodes and release them on September 7, six days earlier than scheduled. The third episode was released on September 13, with one new episode released each Tuesday thru October 25. Follow-up episodes were released in December 2016 and September 2018.
The second season of In the Dark explored the legal odyssey surrounding Curtis Flowers, who was accused of shooting four people to death inside Tardy Furniture, a Winona, Mississippi, store, in July 1996.[14] Flowers, who had worked at Tardy Furniture for only a few days and who had long maintained his innocence, faced trial for the murders six times. The first five of those trials resulted in either hung juries or reversals on appeal. A sixth jury trial, in 2010, ended with Flowers' conviction on four counts of capital murder, but the United States Supreme Court remanded the case to a lower court to review racial bias in jury selection. After Mississippi's Supreme Court upheld Flowers' conviction by a 5–4 vote,[15] Flowers once again went to the U.S. Supreme Court, who heard oral arguments on the appeal in March 2019,[16] and ruled, by a 7–2 decision on June 21, 2019, to overturn his conviction and send the case back to the lower courts.[17] Flowers was moved from death row that September, and released on bail the following December.[18] The Mississippi Attorney General's office reviewed the case and moved to dismiss the indictment against him with prejudice; a judge granted the motion on September 4, 2020.[19]
While the APM Reports team never set out to prove Flowers' guilt or innocence, the investigation featured in In the Dark was credited with alerting the public and turning the case around.[20] Indeed, much as with how its first season focused on the conduct of those investigating Jacob Wetterling's disappearance, Season 2's storyline—which began with an e-mail tip to APM Reports and led to a nearly year-long investigation—pivoted from the murders Flowers had been tried and convicted for to the conduct of the district attorney's office in Mississippi's Fifth Circuit Court District. Actions by two figures in the D.A.'s office are specified, D.A. Doug Evans (who prosecuted Flowers and expressed certainty of his guilt) and office investigator John Johnson (lead investigator in the Tardy Furniture case).
In its investigation of Flowers' case for In the Darks 2nd season, the APM team revealed four noteworthy actions by the D.A.'s office that appeared to ensure Flowers' conviction, actions were mentioned in the state's motion to dismiss:
In addition to examining Flowers' case, In the Darks second season profiled Curtis' family. Historical anecdotes about racial issues in Winona (which has a majority Black population) and northern Mississippi were also incorporated.[23] [24]
Season 2 of In the Dark began with the release of its first two episodes on May 1, 2018, with one new episode being released each Tuesday through, initially, July 3, 2018. Later developments in the Flowers were covered bu additional episodes, the last of which (an interview with Curtis Flowers himself) was released on October 14, 2020.
In spring 2020, In the Dark returned to Mississippi for a limited-run special report. Rather than focus solely on matters of crime or jurisprudence, the special series instead examined the effects of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic on rural America, in particular the Mississippi Delta. Six episodes, released between April and June 2020, were included in the special report.
In the Dark was a two-time recipient of the Peabody Award. The show's first Peabody honor came in spring 2017, with the award's governing body applauding the program for its "immaculate storytelling talent and journalistic precision" in its probing the investigation of Jacob Wetterling's disappearance as well as its "deftly incisive" way of telling the human side of the case and its broader policy implications.[25] The second Peabody came in June 2020, recognizing the show's work in not only "systemically dismantl[ing]" (the jury's term) the case against Curtis Flowers, but also building a case against the District Attorney who prosecuted Flowers, and recognizing those who have lived under the shadow of the case.[26]
| Award | Year | Category | Result | Ref. | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Peabody Awards | 2016 | Podcast & Radio | |||
| 2019 | |||||
| Academy of Podcasters Awards | 2017 | Best News and Politics Podcast | [27] | ||
| iHeartRadio Podcast Awards | 2019 | Best Crime Podcast | [28] |