One of the officers named in the lawsuit, Mason, still works for Lynnwood police. 'Unbelievable' Detectives Botched a Girl's Rape, The 'Unbelievable' Detective Who Stopped a Rapist, Netflix's 'Unbelievable' is Based on a True Story, Toni Collettes 'Unbelievable' Role, Explained, as she's showing clear signs of someone traumatized by the assault, to follow a true story reported by ProPublica, Your Privacy Choices: Opt Out of Sale/Targeted Ads. The bulk of time is spent with Detectives Rasmussen and Duvall, two investigators who diligently work to solve a string of rapes throughout Colorado. The victim, who now lives in Wyoming, and her lawyer also declined to comment to the Seattle Times. Other reporting included pulling transcripts of television news coverage from when Marie was raped and later charged; having court transcripts prepared from when OLeary was sentenced in Colorado; reviewing grant documents for Project Ladder; and mining the criminal-justice literature for expert views on how rape investigations should be conducted. We excluded agencies that did not report crime statistics in any given month, as well as those that reported no crimes of any kind in a year. The description of his background comes from his LinkedIn profile. Adler was 16 when she became Cunninghams first foster kid. They ignored all the objective evidence collected by the Lynnwood Police Department and Providence Hospital on the day of the rape, the lawsuit alleges. Words or thoughts attributed to anyone in this story are drawn from these interviews or documents. Claiming police coerced her into recanting her story, the woman was charged with false reporting and fined $500 when she later tried to insist the rape did happen. In 2011, OLeary was caught and found with a photograph of D.M.s ID card. Last week, D.M. She says the officers bullied her for hours, without a lawyer present, into recanting her account and, when she later tried to insist the rape did take place, she was charged $500 for false reporting. That year, she reported being bound, gagged, and raped by a man who broke into her home. You cant use our work to populate a website designed to improve rankings on search engines or solely to gain revenue from network-based advertisements. Galbraith had admired her new partner, Edna Hendershot, from a distance ever since their paths crossed at a police briefing for a big drug bust Hendershot had taken part in. We ran this calculation for all departments that met our criteria on a national level. Jeff Mason didnt believe her. Detectives Pruitt and Parker are based on real people named Sgt. She was fined $500 in 2009 after entering into a diversionary agreement. Everything You Never Thought to Ask About In-flight Entertainment, Warner Bros. Discoverys licensing chief on how movies and TV get on planes, editing decisions, and the curious case of. This case is where I went full-on ACAB. Cocoon House CEO Cassie Franklin told the Seattle Times this week: 'Our hearts go out to D.M. Since its debut last Friday, Netflix's Unbelievable has become one of the most acclaimed shows of the year. The third doubter was an anonymous caller. Former Lynnwood police Det. OLeary was 33 when he was sentenced to 327 and a half years for the Colorado attacks and an additional 68 and a half years for the two Washington rapes, including Adlers. Mason now admits on record that Peggy's doubt was the main reason he fully shifted to disbelieving Marie. Hendershot also remembered a similar case in 2009 when a 65-year-old woman in nearby Aurora had been raped by a man wearing a black scarf around his face who also took pictures of her. OLeary was convicted of three rapes in Colorado and two in Washington, including the Lynnwood attack and the rape of a 63-year-old Kirkland woman, and is serving a 327-year sentence in a Colorado prison. To calculate the rate, we summed the number of unfounded rapes and divided it by the number of reported rapes. Elsewhere in the country, two other female detectives are also tracking an influx of rapes and are working together to try and catch the guy, who ends up being the same one who harmed Marie. Mission accomplished. Detective Jerry Rittgarn, who declined to be interviewed for the original news story, said he'd talk for the book "only under monetary compensation contract" a quid pro quo the authors. She requested and received a personal apology from lead detective Jeffrey Mason. When the woman reported the attack to Lynnwood police, she says detectives Jerry Rittgarn and Sgt. When youre watching Unbelievable, its hard not to wonder about the accuracy of the Netflix true-crime drama. To determine the rate of rape crimes declared unfounded, or groundless, by law enforcement agencies, we analyzed Uniform Crime Reporting data collected by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. But the only unsavory loose end from the finale is what happened to the men who discredited Marie. Along with a formidable cast that includes Hereditary's Toni Colette and Booksmart's Kaitlyn Dever, the project has many big names attached to it, with Katie Couric as an executive producer and novelist power couple Ayelet Waldman and Michael Chabon as contributing writers. Any website our stories appear on must include a prominent and effective way to contact you. When Mason, accompanied by Detective (Jerry) Rittgarn, went to pick up Marie at about 3:30 p.m., they found her outside her apartment, sitting on the grass. None of them had any firsthand knowledge of what had happened, the lawsuit says. She spoke to a friend on the phone for several hours early Aug. 11, 2008, finally going to bed around 5:30 a.m. She said she left the sliding-glass patio door ajar. Neither officer faced any disciplinary action for the botched investigation. Rittgarn left the police department before Maries rapist was caught in 2011, while Manson simply moved back to his position at narcotics. In it, a young woman named Marie (played by Booksmart's Kaitlyn Dever) tells police she's been the victim of rape by a masked stranger who broke into her home. This email will be used to sign into all New York sites. Toni Collettes intensity as Detective Grace Rasmussen doesnt line up with Edna Hendershots reportedly easygoing demeanor. Last Friday, Netflix released their latest true crime series entitled Unbelievable, which is centered around The Marshall Project and ProPublica's Pulitzer-prize-winning article, An . It was also detailed in the "Anatomy of Doubt" episode of the podcast This American Life. in court documents, was gagged, bound and sexually assaulted at knife-point in her Lynnwood apartment by an intruder five years ago. Unbelievable's parallel cases demonstrate how there's no one way all real rape survivors react to what's happened to them (since, you know, no two people are exactly alike). As in the series, Cunningham and Maries transitional housing case manager were with Marie when police arrived after the rape, and she later shared her doubts about it with them. O'Leary was convicted of five rapes, including the Lynnwood one, and is serving a 327-year sentence in a Colorado prison. The journalists who wrote it, T. Christian Miller and Ken Armstrong, were separately working on the story for their respective outlets when they decided to collaborate on one long piece. Though she found it hard to watch, she said the series was excellent and even encouraged both of her foster moms, with whom shes still in touch, to watch it. In hindsight, it was my job to get to the bottom of it and I didnt.. According to the suit, Rittgarn and Mason had D.M. She also accuses them of threatening to have her thrown out of her apartment, owned by an at-risk youth home called Cocoon House, when she insisted it did take place. After OLeary was caught, McQuery apologized to Adler and later told This American Life she was shocked that Adler was willing to forgive her for such a huge thing., Like Scott Lawrences effective Fed, FBI special agent Jonny Grusing was a crucial part of the task force that aided the detectives work. Rittgarn wrote that, Based on her answer and body language it was apparent that D.M. This story was produced in collaboration with ProPublica. Los Angeles County said all litigation over the crash has now been resolved. UnitedHealthcare Tried to Deny Coverage to a Chronically Ill Patient. Anyone with information is asked to call Lynnwood detective Jerry Rittgarn at 425-744-6924 or 425-744-6900. Netflix The detectives who disbelieved Marie and coerced her into recanting her story also faced fairly minimal repercussions in real life. Jeffrey Mason, Sgt. was lying about the rape, according to documents filed in U.S. District Court. University of . The rapist, Marc O'Leary, is. If you use canonical metadata, please use the ProPublica URL. Edna Hendershot and Sgt. In hindsight, it was my job to get to the bottom of it and I didnt.. Rittgarn asked Marie. New Report Says Nurses at Illinois Facility Forced Patients to Dig Through Their Own Feces, Records Reveal Medical Response Further Delayed Care for Uvalde Victims, Donald Trump Built a National Debt So Big (Even Before the Pandemic) That Itll Weigh Down the Economy for Years, Hoping to Prevent Repeat of Botched Response to Uvalde, Lawmaker Calls for Improved Training for Police, EMTs, If youre republishing online, you must link to the URL of this story on propublica.org, include all of the links from our story, including our newsletter sign up language and link, and use our. He Fought Back, Exposing the Insurers Inner Workings. After the man left, Marie maneuvered a drawer open with her feet, cut herself free with scissors, and called for help. The woman, identified in the lawsuit by the initials D.M., says she was forced to undergo counseling when Lynnwood police told managers of the at-risk youth program where she was living in 2008 that they didnt believe shed been raped, according to court documents. Things you buy through our links may earnNew Yorka commission. Stacy Galbraith (left) has been lightly fictionalized as Karen Duvall, played by Merritt Wever (right), in, This password will be used to sign into all, Photo: Vulture, Benjamin Rasmussen/Getty Images and Netflix, Stacy Galbraith/Karen Duvall (Merritt Wever), Edna Hendershot/Grace Rasmussen (Toni Collette), Peggy Cunningham/Judith (Elizabeth Marvel), Shannon McQuery/Colleen (Bridget Everett), FBI Special Agent Jonny Grusing/Billy Taggart (Scott Lawrence), Detective Jeffrey Mason/Robert Parker (Eric Lange), Detective Jerry Rittgarn/Pruitt (Bill Fagerbakke), Michael OLeary/Curtis McCarthy (Aaron Staton), Marc OLeary/Christopher McCarthy (Blake Ellis), Okay, TikTok, You Can Calm Down About Aubrey Plaza at the SAG Awards Now, All 165 Pink Floyd Songs Ranked, From Worst to Best, Vanessa Bryant Settles Helicopter-Crash Photo Lawsuit for $28.85 Million. Like her fictional counterpart, played with heartbreaking vulnerability by Kaitlyn Dever, Adler was a product of the foster-care system and had been abused. Evidence proved her right. Its okay to put our stories on pages with ads, but not ads specifically sold against our stories. We went to the ocean, it was like 7 oclock at night, I dont know what we were thinking, I got in there and I jumped out and swung my hair back.". An Unbelievable Story of Rape And what might be the most unbelievable part of unbelievable is that the detectives who believed Marie was lying weren't reprimanded whatsoever, even though they deeply damaged this young woman emotionally. From there, the show continues to follow a true story reported by ProPublica. Here's a look at how Unbelievable is different from the cases that inspired it, and what stayed the same. Why didnt you write that you made the story up? Social scientists examining police records in detail and using methodologically rigorous standards cite similar, single-digit rates. From research and studies summarized in a Department of Justice-funded study, Policing and Prosecuting Sexual Assault in Los Angeles City and County, 2012 by Cassia Spohn and Katharine Tellis and from an analysis by ProPublica and The Marshall Project of FBI Uniform Crime Reporting program data, 20082012. When the woman reported the attack to Lynnwood police, she says detectives Jerry Rittgarn and Sgt. was also taken to the emergency room at Providence Hospital in Everett, where a doctor made notes of rape trauma. Enter detectives Stacy Galbraith from Denver and Edna Hendershot from Westminster. Also named in the suit are Rittgarn . The program's counselors had made Marie stand in front of the other program members to tell them she'd lied, and said she'd be evicted unless she underwent more counseling. Rittgarn, on the other hand, had been a detective for 11 years, but had a background in helicopters and the aerospace industry. As for how she felt arresting OLeary after discovering the birthmark on his leg that her victim had remembered, Galbraith said, I wanted to see the look on his face. Nonprofit journalism about criminal justice, A nonprofit news organization covering the U.S. criminal justice system, This story was produced in collaboration with, International Association of Chiefs of Police, National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey, Policing and Prosecuting Sexual Assault in Los Angeles City and County. We may earn commission from links on this page, but we only recommend products we back. She walked away with $150,000, according to the Seattle Times. With mounting pressure from the police, she recanted her statement and said she made it . . By submitting your email, you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy and to receive email correspondence from us. Words or thoughts attributed to anyone in this story are drawn from these interviews or documents. At first, the detectives are attempting to catch the man who broke into her apartment and raped her. The eight-episode series works on two different timelines. Kristen Bell to Befriend an Unorthodox Rabbi. The real Marie sued the Lynnwood Police Department, according to the Seattle Times; she claimed the officers had disregarded evidence and bullied her into recanting. After OLearys arrest, the city returned the fine and the court struck the case from its files. Jerry Rittgarn declined to be interviewed. Talk to us You can tell us about news and ask us about our journalism by emailing . When I went to sleep I dreamed that someone broke in and raped me. Thank you for your interest in republishing this story. Jeff Mason didn't believe her. Marie, crying, said she believed the rape really happened. After attacking her, he forced the woman to shower, took her bedding with him before leaving, and cleaned his ejaculate with moist towelettes. 2 yr. ago The LinkedIn profile looked abandoned to me, but he does show up on other sites. Jeffrey Mason, the Lynnwood officer heading up Marie's rape investigation (and subsequently charged her for a false report) was transferred to his department from a narcotics task force just six weeks before the call came from Marie. It follows the initial investigation into a the assault of a young woman named Marie. Trevor Materasso; Lakewood, Colorado, police detective Aaron Hassell; Kirkland, Washington, police officer Audra Weber; Lynnwood police Sgt. Our editors handpick the products that we feature. Donations from readers like you are essential to sustaining this work. In real life, Jerry had already left the Lynnwood Police Department before Marie's attacker was convicted, and as far as we can tell, he has declined requests to be interviewed in the time. Jayne Tainis Doris Laird is based on the 65-year-old fraternity housemother whose teddy bear, like her fictional counterparts, yielded some DNA. Marie said she didnt know of any discrepancies. The Lynnwood detectives, Pruitt and Parker, are Jerry Rittgarn and Sgt. The people interviewed for this story include Marie (in our story, we agreed to use only her middle name); Maries foster mothers Peggy Cunningham and Shannon McQuery; Maries friend Jordan Schweitzer; James Feldman, Maries public defender when she was charged with filing a false police report; H. Richmond Fisher, Maries attorney in her civil suit against Lynnwood, Washington; Golden, Colorado, police Det. Two months after Adler was charged with false reporting, McQuery told the police investigating a new, similar rape nearby about her case. Jerry Rittgarn declined to be interviewed. Some of the way that she was acting was part of the reason why it had the outcome that it did, she said. In a testament to her resilience, Marie's carved out a life for herself far from Lynnwood. According to an outside review of the investigation after Marie was cleared of her false report misdemeanor, "the manner in which she was treated by Sergeant Mason and Detective Rittgarn can only be labeled as bullying and coercive." confessed to making up the incident, which her attorneys said was a result of a police interrogation. We may earn a commission from these links. When she wouldn't, they pressured her further until she ultimately reneged on her confession. (Jeff) Mason concerning his follow-up case. She got married and has two kids, and they live "somewhere in the middle of the country" as of 2018. The victim of the Lynnwood attack last week filed a federal civil-rights lawsuit against the city of Lynnwood, claiming detectives disregarded evidence of the assault, bullied her into saying it didnt happen and then threatened to have her thrown out of her apartment when she insisted it did. Read the story here. USMC. At the hospital, a doctor noted injuries to both her wrists and abrasions on her genitals. Jeffrey Mason, Sgt. In 2008, Marie, as the article refers to her, was an 18-year-old woman who lived in subsidized housing in Lynnwood, WA, for young adults previously in the fostercare system. In December 2015, ProPublica and the Marshall Project co-published An Unbelievable Story of Rape. and her family We strongly believe that Cocoon House and its employees acted appropriately on behalf of the client.. three days after the assault, officers picked up D.M. As The Marshall Project article specifies, Manson (who was the lead investigator), had previously only worked on patrol and in narcotics, but had recently been promoted and transferred to the Criminal Investigations Division and had been in the position for only six weeks when Maries rape happened. This includes publishing or syndicating our work on platforms or apps such as Apple News, Google News, etc. 22:32 GMT 11 Jun 2013 She pounded the table and said she was pretty positive.. He said he believed she had made the story up a spur-of-the-moment thing, not something planned out. We used the 2015 Pulitzer Prizewinning ProPublica/Marshall Project story (and its follow-up reporting) that inspired Unbelievable as a road map to make this character-by-character guide to the facts behind the Unbelievable fictionalizations. Grusings search for similar rape cases turned up an old unsolved burglary (Lillys story) with evidence the honeycomb glove pattern, the Adidas shoe print, and the white Mazda pickup truck that connected all the known rapes. "Based on her answers and body language it was apparent that [Marie] was lying about the rape," he wrote in a report. Michael was tailed by members of Grusings team to get his DNA. The storys called Unbelievable because at first, the detectives dont believe the story Marie (Kaitlyn Dever) is telling them and dismiss her, before charging her for filing a false claim. We would like to show you a description here but the site won't allow us. The description of his background comes from his LinkedIn profile. Other reporting included pulling transcripts of television news coverage from when Marie was raped and later charged; having court transcripts prepared from when OLeary was sentenced in Colorado; reviewing grant documents for Project Ladder; and mining the criminal-justice literature for expert views on how rape investigations should be conducted. In January 2011, rapist Marc OLeary was apprehended, and the head of the criminal-investigations division showed up at Adlers door to tell her that her photo had been found among his things. Maybe the rape happened and I blacked it out, Marie said. When Mason, accompanied by Detective (Jerry) Rittgarn, went to pick up Marie at about 3:30 p.m., they found her outside her apartment, sitting on the grass. The woman claims she signed that statement under duress after having been questioned for hours without an attorney. Jensen, the Lynnwood police chief, said he could not comment because of the litigation. She and her husband took in the high-schooler for a short time when her previous foster familys plans to adopt her fell through. However, based on those statements, D.M. Mason wasnt fired and now leads a narcotics task force. LYNNWOOD, Wash. The city of Lynnwood will pay $150,000 in a settlement with a rape victim, after Lynnwood police claimed she lied about the attack in 2008. As previously noted, Detective Rittgarn left the department prior to Marie's rapist being caught. And for him to know that we figured you out. Galbraith is now a Colorado Bureau of Investigation agent. According to the Seattle Times, two-and-a-half years later Lynnwood police reopened the investigation, after Marc O'Leary, a man wanted for a string of sex attacks in Washington state and Colorado, was found to have D.M. These female detectives (whose names are changed to Grace Rasmussen and Karen Duvall, played by Toni Collette and Merritt Weaver, in the Netflix series) actually do their job, and work to uncover the truth behind the rapes. Rarely do. Mason was put in the lead position, but at that time. In August 2008, the victim, identified only as D.M., was in transitional housing after being in foster homes. In a statement, Cocoon House CEO Cassie Franklin said our hearts go out to D.M. Tearfully, she described her past all the foster parents, being raped when she was 7, getting her own place and feeling alone. VIDEO: Rape victim was called a liar by police. 2023 Vox Media, LLC. 's photograph and ID card in his wallet. View Jerry Rittgarn's profile on LinkedIn, the world's largest professional community. The (male) detectives Marie goes to see after shes raped believe shes lying and get a coerced confession out of her recanting what shes already reported. It was one of many friendships she lost after the Lynnwood charged her as a false accuser. He had only investigated one rape before working with Marie. And we dont want to see this happen to anybody ever again.. Marie had a horrific childhood, bouncing around various foster and group homes from around age 6, and was sexually and physically abused throughout. His LinkedIn page indicates he works for a private investigation firm in San Diego. The Lynnwood police told her the news, giving her an envelope on counseling for rape victims. LYNNWOOD, Wash. The city of Lynnwood will pay $150,000 in a settlement with a rape victim, after Lynnwood police claimed she lied about the attack in 2008. In 2011, Galbraith worked on a Denver case where a young woman living alone was sexually assaulted by a man in a black mask who documented the rape with a digital camera. What Happened To Male Detectives In Unbelievable Case? Seattleite, (mostly) retired arts/culture blogger. The national average for "unfounded" cases is around five percent. After I got off the phone with him, I started thinking about all things I was stressed out and I also was scared living on my own. This, undoubtedly, turns her life upside down. Looking into similar crimes, the women discovered a case in Lakewood, another Denver suburb, where a masked man attacked and bound a woman at knifepoint in her home. An 18 year old girl reported a brutal assault. They themselves took those pictures. Between one-fourth to two-thirds of rapists are serial attackers, studies show. From JAMA Pediatrics, December 2015 and Violence and Victims, Vol 17, 2002 by David Lisak and Paul M. Miller. Mason has since returned to working in narcotics. . When the woman reported the attack to Lynnwood police, she says detectives Jerry Rittgarn and Sgt. While the characters are inspired by the two investigators and their excellent work in catching real serial rapist Marc Patrick OLeary, they're not interchangeable with their offscreen counterparts. Mason is still with the Lynnwood Police Department. The lawsuit alleges police ignored or disregarded this evidence once they convinced themselves she was not telling the truth. 2023 Cox Media Group. He tied her hands behind her back with a lace from her tennis shoe, blindfolded her and gagged her. Unlike her avatar, she left her Costco job handing out food samples days after her 2008 rape. But like her fictional counterpart, the real officer was more seasoned than Galbraith, having investigated more than 100 rapes by the time the two partnered up. Jerry Rittgarn declined to be interviewed. Rittgarn left the police department before Marie's rapist was caught in 2011, while Manson simply moved back to his position at narcotics. All Rights Reserved. According to ProPublica's article, an internal review found that from 2008 to 2012, "10 of 47 rapes reported to Lynnwood police were unfounded21.3 percent. Rodney Cohnheim and Commander Steve Rider; and Marc OLeary, who was interviewed at the Sterling Correctional Facility in Colorado. According to A False Report, she became a long-haul trucker. , updated Notably, Marie's rape claim was one of four that Lynnwood police deemed unfounded that year alone. Jeffrey Mason and Jerry Rittgarn, pressed on the inconsistencies in her story. For more information about canonical metadata, You cant edit our material, except to reflect relative changes in time, location and editorial style. He actually met with Marie again after the truth came. A police narrative from Detective Jerry Rittgarn states, "I talked with Sgt. Former Lynnwood police Det. Now he was leading one. Parker says something similar to Rasmussen in the show. She is charged with false reporting, ostracized from friends and family, and made a pariah by local media. In August 2008, a stranger broke into the apartment of an 18-year-old Lynnwood woman, gagged her, bound her hands with a shoelace and raped her. Unbelievable will debut on Netflix on Sept. 13. Some DNA her fictional counterparts, yielded some DNA life for herself far Lynnwood... Assault of a young woman named Marie back, Exposing the Insurers Inner Workings it. T allow us on this page, but he does show up on other sites Materasso... 'S rape claim was one of many friendships she lost after the truth tailed... To show you a description here but the only unsavory loose end from cases... Jeff Mason didn & # x27 ; t believe her with scissors, and made a pariah local! Ago the LinkedIn profile and Privacy Policy and to receive email correspondence us... Youre watching Unbelievable, its hard not to wonder about the rape according... 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