This documentary recounts the dysfunctional state of the death penalty in the state of California by revisiting the crimes, arrest, trials and appeals of Lawrence Bittaker, a convicted serial killer who has been on death row at San Quentin since 1981.
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Yawn. Poorly Filmed Snooze Fest.
hyped garbage
Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.
While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.
In 1979, Lawrence Bittaker and Roy Norris kidnapped, raped, tortured and murdered five teenage girls in California. Although Norris was already a convicted rapist when they first met, Bittaker is by far the worst of the two. Norris was offered a plea - testify against Bittaker in return for the death penalty being taken off the table. He accepted and did. Bittaker was sentenced to death in 1981; three decades on when this film was made, he had still not been executed. The man behind it, Philip Gibbons, wanted to know why. Herein he finds out, and tells the viewer."The Devil And The Death Penalty" includes much archive video but also a long interview with the district attorney who prosecuted Bittaker; Steve Kay worked on the Tate-LaBiancha case along with Vincent Bugliosi, but he says this was worse than Manson, the worst ever. If you watch it all the way through, you may well agree with that, so - trigger warning - if you are of a sensitive disposition, don't.Although the death penalty has long been out of fashion, there is a place for it as long as men like Bittaker walk the Earth, a sentiment shared by Kay, and doubtless by the families of Norris and Bittaker's young victims.
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