Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} Unbelievable by T. Christian Miller Unbelievable: the quiet power of Netflix's fact-based rape drama. I n the second episode of the Netflix drama series Unbelievable, detective Karen Duvall, played by Merritt Wever, conducts what I imagine could be a high-budget training video for sexual assault investigators. Duvall finds the victim, a college student named Amber, processing in the stairwell of her apartment building in Golden, Colorado, one morning in 2011. Duvall already knows the outline of the crime – breaking and entering, a rape that lasted for hours – but she starts at the beginning, smoothly guiding Amber through an interview step by step, checking her comfort level with each question. Her voice is disarming and pillowy, couching sentences with “if it’s all right with you”, “if you’re comfortable” and “take your time”. Yet she builds a case, detail by detail. When she visits Amber at the hospital after her physical exam, she requests the nurse on duty to “ask her if she wants me to come in, but make it clear that if she doesn’t, that’s absolutely fine.” Then she immediately calls the station to block off conference room three for her investigation. In other words: she does good work. The whole episode is a portrait in how things should be – how serious sexual assault cases should be taken, how crucial it is to listen to victims, how memory lapses and scattered details should be considered part and parcel of trauma memory, not a strike against it. It just so happens in this case, what should be is also what was – the episode, written by Susannah Grant, the series co-creator with Michael Chabon and Ayelet Waldman, is based on the true story outlined in An Unbelievable Story of Rape, a 2015 article by T Christian Miller and Ken Armstrong co-published by ProPublica and the Marshall Project. Karen Duvall is inspired by the real detective Stacy Galbraith, also of Golden, who said in the article that her one rule of investigations is to “listen and verify”. In the show, as in real life, Duvall/Galbraith and the detective Grace Rasmussen (based on the real Edna Hendershot) of neighboring Westminster, Colorado, partner up to pursue what they soon realize is a serial rapist evading justice, in part, by exploiting the police’s lack of communication between departments, especially on cold rape cases. Their process is diligent – late nights, meticulous lists of all cars captured in one recovered security video, data sets on data sets – and crackling, in the way watching two people consistently level each other up can be; inspiring, in their empathy and doggedness; refreshing, in a way more visceral than intellectual – it holds my frustratingly short attention span, without draining it. This part of the show transcends so-called “competence porn” (as in, the thrill of watching talented, smart people work together to solve problems) in part because it acts as the corrective to its other, far more brutal half. Duvall and Rasmussen aren’t even introduced until the second episode; the first belongs to Marie Adler (Kaitlyn Dever), an 18-year-old on the brink of self-sufficiency after a string of foster homes when she calls 911 in Lynwood, Washington, in August 2008. She reports an hours-long rape by a masked stranger, but the police take the opposite tack than Duvall. They elevate minor inconsistencies in Marie’s story into major discrepancies, play her precarious housing situation as leverage, corner her – both in practice and Lisa Cholodenko’s camera – into vertiginous doubt. She fearfully recants, and is charged with false reporting. Marie’s report and its aftermath splices Duvall and Rasmussen’s investigation of eerily similar rapes three years later, though neither know it. The stories are two sides of the same coin – on one, the system failing; on the other, the system working – and listening – as it should. It illustrates two truths at the same time: law enforcement fails victims routinely, banally, devastatingly; there are also good actors who do the work. Unbelievable balances the two without veering into the salacious or exploitative – the assaults cast in brief memory flashes rather than scenes – or outrage- inducing. There’s certainly a place for outrage – Roll Red Roll, a documentary about the Steubenville, Ohio, high school gang rape from a year after the events in Unbelievable, and Chanel Miller’s upcoming book Know My Name, on the Brock Turner case, remind us that there are shockingly few consequences for assailants deemed “promising” or when a shard of doubt on the victim’s credibility can paint an assault as “grey area”. But Unbelievable doesn’t focus on opposition, on uncovering incompetence or bad attitudes in law enforcement or the community. It takes as a given what most of its likely audience already knows: that these obstacles exist, that they must be known and considered, that the conversation moving forward starts from here. Instead, the focus is on getting the job done – in this case, finding and locking up the serial rapist, giving the victims space and recognition to heal, unwittingly correcting the devastating mistake on Marie’s record three years before. Kaitlyn Dever in Unbelievable. Photograph: Beth Dubber/NETFLIX. Perhaps Unbelievable works, too, as a corrective on old detective story tropes. I’m usually drawn to the self-sabotaging or self-negating – Amy Adams careening through a vodka-soaked and glaringly unethical journalism venture in Sharp Objects, or the melancholic True Detectives. I enjoy the quick hits of resolution in episodic procedurals such as Law & Order SVU, in which the victims usually have crazy backstories and, at most, a few scenes in an episode or two. But there’s something refreshing about seeing two women do their job free of dramatic embellishment – tackle their case and then go home to their families, to complicated yet stable marriages. It helps that Unbelievable boasts a next-level cast given several episodes to grow. If Dever didn’t already arrive with her scene-stealing turn in Booksmart, then she’s here now as Marie. Wever can convey more feeling with a head-tilt and a “hmm” than many could do with a whole monologue. And Collette fills Rasmussen’s steely, guy’s gal shell with a visceral sense of responsibility and faith in her work. Maybe it’s that disciplined responsibility that floored me, that made Unbelievable so watchable, despite its grim subject. The unveiling of #MeToo stories the past few years have pummeled me, taught me to mostly doubt justice, to sometimes value trauma as the most publicly interesting and formative thing about women; given this, to see two female detectives do their work well, grind on the job and struggle with the usual work/life balance confounds expectations. Listen. Verify. Back at the hospital in Colorado, Duvall reassures: “You don’t need to explain any of your decisions to me,” she says when Amber tries to justify why she hasn’t called anyone – a concern clearly rooted in the knowledge that reporting sexual assault and harassment almost always means reporting on your credibility, too. Later, Duvall walks Amber to a friend’s apartment, gives her number, says she’ll be in touch. She lingers a moment at the closed door, pondering, soaking it in. Then she gets back to work. ProPublica Wins Third Pulitzer Prize for ‘An Unbelievable Story of Rape’ T. Christian Miller, a senior reporter for ProPublica, and Ken Armstrong, a writer for The Marshall Project, won the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Reporting for “An Unbelievable Story of Rape,” their harrowing account of the hunt for a serial rapist. The award is the third Pulitzer Prize for ProPublica, and the first for The Marshall Project, both of which are nonprofit newsrooms. Read the Story. An Unbelievable Story of Rape. An 18-year-old said she was attacked at knifepoint. Then she said she made it up. That’s where our story begins. Other Stories in the Prize-winning Package. The FBI Built a Database That Can Catch Rapists — Almost Nobody Uses It. For roughly 30 years the FBI has virtually ignored a system meant to help cops track the behavioral patterns of violent criminals. Rape is Rape, Isn’t It? It depends on who is counting, and what they count. A Brutal Crime, Often Terribly Investigated. ProPublica and The Marshall Project’s “An Unbelievable Story of Rape” underscored the need for improving rape investigations. Here’s how. Transcript: How Not to Handle a Rape Investigation. ProPublica and The Marshall Project hosted a Digg Dialog with retired San Diego Police Sgt. Joanne Archambault, who leads the nonprofit End Violence Against Women International, to discuss best practices for law enforcement investigating sex crimes. How We Reported It. The reporting by ProPublica and The Marshall Project spanned several months and involved numerous interviews, a review of previously undisclosed law enforcement records and exchanges with experts on investigating rape. Your donation supports ProPublica reporters in an unrelenting pursuit of the truth. More About This Reporting. Miller and Armstrong collaborated on the piece after coming across one another while they were both investigating the same story: the saga of an 18-year-old woman who had reported being raped at knifepoint in her apartment outside Seattle. Local police did not believe the woman’s story and ultimately prosecuted her for lying to authorities. Years later, two female detectives arrested a man suspected of raping a series of women in the suburbs of Denver. His camera contained pictures of his victims, including one of the young woman from Seattle. Rather than rush separately to publication, Miller and Armstrong decided to join forces in hopes of producing the best single story. The result was a powerful mix of narrative, exposé and astute analysis. Using previously unreleased police records and first-ever interviews with the woman in Washington, known as Marie; the lead detective in the botched police investigation; the serial rapist and others, Miller and Armstrong showed how disastrously wrong rape investigations can go when law enforcement fails to take victims seriously. Their reporting unearthed the abusive interrogation of the victim, one that resulted in her agreeing to plead guilty to lying about the attack; the fact that Marie was forced to apologize to her neighbors for making up the story as a condition of keeping her subsidized housing; and the attempt by local authorities to avoid compensating Marie beyond returning the $500 in court fees she had accrued during her wrongful prosecution. Taking readers inside the committed investigation of the detectives in Colorado, the reporters illuminated best practices for police investigators who want to both catch the guilty and protect the victimized. Several enforcement agencies have requested permission to use the article as part of their training programs. “An Unbelievable Story of Rape exhibits precisely the work that ProPublica was created to do: Use the moral force of investigative journalism to shine a light on abuses of power and spur reform,” said ProPublica editor-in-chief Stephen Engelberg. ProPublica senior reporter Abrahm Lustgarten was also a finalist for this year’s Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting, for “Killing the Colorado,” his groundbreaking investigation on the water crisis in the American West. A detailed indictment that traces the crisis to flawed public policy driven by greed and political cowardice, the piece marks ProPublica’s fifth Pulitzer finalist. ProPublica reporters received Pulitzer Prizes for Investigative Reporting in 2010 and National Reporting in 2011, in addition to being a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service in 2010. A False Report Summary and Reviews. Two Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists tell the riveting true story of Marie, a teenager who was charged with lying about having been raped, and the detectives who followed a winding path to arrive at the truth. On August 11, 2008, eighteen-year-old Marie reported that a masked man broke into her apartment near Seattle, Washington, and raped her. Within days police and even those closest to Marie became suspicious of her story: details of the crime didn't seem plausible and her foster mother thought she sounded as though she were reciting a Law & Order episode. The police swiftly pivoted and began investigating Marie. Confronted with inconsistencies in her story and the doubts of others, Marie broke down and said her story was a lie - a bid for attention. Police charged Marie with false reporting. One of Marie's best friends created a web page branding her a liar. More than two years later, Colorado detective Stacy Galbraith was assigned to investigate a case of sexual assault. Describing the crime to her husband that night - the attacker's calm and practiced demeanor, which led the victim to surmise "he's done this before" - Galbraith learned that the case bore an eerie resemblance to a rape that had taken place months earlier in a nearby town. She joined forces with the detective on that case, Edna Hendershot, and the two soon realized they were dealing with a serial rapist: a man who photographed his victims, threatening to release the images online, and whose calculated steps to erase all physical evidence suggested he might be a soldier or a cop. Through meticulous police work the detectives would eventually connect the rapist to other attacks in Colorado - and beyond. Based on investigative files and extensive interviews with the principals, A False Report is a serpentine tale of doubt, lies, and a hunt for justice, unveiling the disturbing reality of how sexual assault is investigated today - and the long history of skepticism toward rape victims. Reviews "Beyond the Book" articles Free books to read and review (US only) Find books by time period, setting & theme Read-alike suggestions by book and author Book club discussions and much more! Just $12 for 3 months or $39 for a year. Reviews. Media Reviews. "Starred Review. Miller and Armstrong excavate a disturbing strain of misogyny in American culture in this account of the mistreatment of victims of sexual assault in the criminal justice system…[ A False Report ] shines a critical light on an urgent and timely subject." - Publishers Weekly. "Starred Review. The authors describe how [several] cases come together in a highly suspenseful (chapters often end in cliffhangers) and thorough manner that still considers the victims and avoids gratuity… This timely, well-researched, highly readable account will appeal to readers interested in true crime and social justice issues." - Booklist. "A riveting and disturbing true-crime story that reflects the enduring atrocity of rape in America." - Kirkus. " A False Report is a reporting triumph: a heartbreaking deep dive into a case gone horribly wrong; a bone-chilling portrait of a monstrous criminal; and a forceful cri de coeur on behalf of those victims whose claims fall on deaf ears. You'll never read another crime story quite like it." - Robert Kolker, author of Lost Girls. "This is a deep, disturbing, compelling, important book. A False Report digs into timeless issues - crime, victimhood, honesty, sexism- which have never been more timely. It is also a fascinating, sharply written story that will twist and surprise you." - Susan Orlean, author of The Orchid Thief and Rin Tin Tin. "America has never adequately addressed sexual violence, a tragedy made worse by many who employ their own hierarchy of victimization, leaving many women and vulnerable people unaided. This meticulously researched, powerful exposé eliminates ignorance as a defense. This is a devastating but necessary read, composed by masters of investigative journalism." - Bryan Stevenson, author of Just Mercy. "Miller and Armstrong show how gender bias, and the many myths about sexual assault, still have far too much influence in the way law enforcement investigates these crimes. Well-researched and compassionate, A False Report is essential reading for police, prosecutors, and lawmakers, and for all those seeking to do better for victims of sexual assault." - Joanne Archambault, CEO of End Violence Against Women International. " A False Report is a gripping and often devastating tale. By bringing their characters alive, Miller and Armstrong do not judge so much as illuminate the deep sexism that continues to pervade our society's treatment of rape. Better still, the women in this book are strong protagonists as much as victims." - Anne-Marie Slaughter, president and CEO of New America; author of Unfinished Business. "Far too many women and girls who are sexually assaulted never report it - often out of fear they won't be believed. A False Report reveals the true cost of doubting women's accounts of rape. This fascinating, deeply troubling book has the power to spark a national conversation about how our criminal justice system fails victims, and how it can be reformed." - Peggy Orenstein, author of Girls & Sex. "This is a grim, important, meticulously reported book that denounces breakdowns in the system of investigating crimes against women. A False Report has all the detail, drama, and humanity that make the finest nonfiction as compelling as a novel." - Sebastian Rotella, author of Rip Crew. This information about A False Report shown above was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. In most cases, the reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that the reviews shown do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, please send us a message with the mainstream media reviews that you would like to see added. Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published. Reader Reviews. This is a well written book about a very difficult subject. In 2008 an 18-year-old woman reported that she had been raped at knifepoint in her apartment in Lynwood, WA. The police did not believe her because there were inconsistencies in her story. The victim finally admitted that she had lied, the investigating officer charged her with charged with a gross misdemeanor, punishable by up to a year in jail. What happened was that the police did not believe her and pressured her to recant her story, not understanding that many victims of violent crimes have difficulty describing what happened to them. The inconsistencies weren’t because she was lying, the inconsistencies were caused by the trauma she suffered. Ken Armstong, The Marshall Project and Christian Miller, ProPublica working in tandem have written about how police treat rape victims. While the Lynnwood police department did not believe their rape victim, the police in Golden, Colorado did, and they followed the correct procedures for handling rape crimes. First off, they believed their victims; they reached out to other area police departments looking for similar type occurrences. When confirmations of other similar rapes came, the police departments worked together to identify the rapist, Marc Leary. This book examines how we as a society view rape. How are views were shaped, why we see some of the reactions to people claim of sexual assault. The #MeToo movement will hopefully have a positive impact on our handling of sexual assault. Reviews "Beyond the Book" articles Free books to read and review (US only) Find books by time period, setting & theme Read-alike suggestions by book and author Book club discussions and much more! Just $12 for 3 months or $39 for a year. More Information. T. Christian Miller joined ProPublica as a senior reporter in 2008. Before that, he worked for the Los Angeles Times, where he covered politics, wars, and was once kidnapped by leftist guerrillas in Colombia. His first book, Blood Money: Wasted Billions, Lost Lives, and Corporate Greed In Iraq was called one of the "indispensable" books on the war. He teaches data journalism at the University of California at Berkeley and was a Knight Fellow at Stanford University. Ken Armstrong, who joined ProPublica in 2017, previously worked at The Marshall Project and Chicago Tribune, where his work helped prompt the Illinois governor to suspend executions and empty death row. His first book, Scoreboard, Baby , with Nick Perry, won the Edgar Allan Poe Award for non-fiction. He has been the McGraw Professor of Writing at Princeton and a Nieman Fellow at Harvard. They have both won numerous awards, including a 2016 Pulitzer Prize for their article "An Unbelievable Story of Rape," written for ProPublica and The Marshall Project. Press Releases. A FALSE REPORT: A TRUE STORY OF RAPE IN AMERICA By T. Christian Miller and Ken Armstrong. Based on the Pulitzer Prize-Winning Article. A False Report. T. Christian Miller and Ken Armstrong. Imprint: Crown On sale: February 6, 2018 Price: $28.0 Pages: 304 ISBN: 9781524759933. Advance Praise for A FALSE REPORT. “Shines a critical light on an urgent and timely subject.” — Publishers Weekly, starred review. “The authors describe how [several] cases come together in a highly suspenseful (chapters often end in cliffhangers) and thorough manner that still considers the victims and avoids gratuity. . . . This timely, well-researched, highly readable account will appeal to readers interested in true crime and social justice issues.” — Booklist, starred review. “Chilling . . . The authors display meticulous investigative reporting skills . . . A riveting and disturbing true-crime story that reflects the enduring atrocity of rape in America.” — Kirkus Reviews. “A timely account from two Pulitzer Prize–winning journalists follows the story of a young woman who was charged with lying about her rape. These reporters dig deep to discover the truth.” — Elite Daily. “Sure to be an essential—but gut-wrenching—read.” — Bustle. Police said it was an unbelievable story. In 2008, an eighteen-year-old woman named Marie reported being raped in her apartment in Lynnwood, Washington, a suburb of Seattle. She had awoken to a man standing in her bedroom doorway, his face obscured by a mask. Holding a knife, he tied her up with her own shoelaces and assaulted her. During the course of the attack, he photographed her, threatening that if she told the police, he’d post the pictures on the Internet for the world to see. Then he left. Within days, however, Marie’s claims were met by skepticism. Even Marie’s foster mother began to question her story, which sounded like something out of Law & Order, and wondered about her demeanor and actions following the attack. She thought Marie’s story might be a desperate bid for attention. After repeated interviews, the detectives on her case deemed aspects of her story inconsistent. They stopped searching for a rapist and instead turned their investigation to Marie. With her support system in tatters and under pressure from detectives, Marie took back her story, saying she had lied about the rape; the police charged Marie with false reporting. Branded a liar, Marie was left to try to pick up the pieces of her life. More than two years later, another detective, nearly 1,400 miles away in Colorado, would make a discovery: a photograph, extracted from the camera of a serial rapist. It was a young woman, bound, with something on her chest—a learner’s permit placed there by her attacker. The location: Lynnwood, Washington. The young woman’s name: Marie. Marie’s story was first brought to national attention by acclaimed journalists T. Christian Miller and Ken Armstrong in their Pulitzer Prize–winning article, “An Unbelievable Story of Rape,” copublished by ProPublica and the Marshall Project in 2015. In that piece, Miller and Armstrong showed readers how Marie’s rapist—a man who had sexually assaulted numerous women—almost got away with his crimes. They introduced Stacy Galbraith and Edna Hendershot, two veteran detectives from different cities in Colorado who were each investigating separate claims of rape. As police agencies do not routinely share information, the two women didn’t know they were on the hunt for the same rapist until, in a complete fluke, Galbraith learned that her case bore a striking resemblance to an attack that had taken place months earlier in a nearby town. Galbraith and Hendershot would bring their agencies together—along with state and federal investigators—to solve the case, culminating in the arrest and conviction of serial rapist Marc Patrick O’Leary—and the discovery of the truth about Marie. In A FALSE REPORT: A True Story of Rape in America (Crown; February 6, 2018), Miller and Armstrong have continued their reporting to further illuminate the disturbing reality of how our society—and especially law enforcement—treats victims of sexual assault. Through interviews with numerous police officers involved in the case, including Detectives Galbraith and Hendershot; Marie and the people in her life who doubted her; and even the rapist, Marc Patrick O’Leary, Miller and Armstrong present what is truly an unbelievable story: that of a victim who wasn’t believed, a rapist who almost averted capture, and a system of justice that failed the very people it is supposed to protect. Slated to become an eight-part scripted series for Netflix, A FALSE REPORT is both a deeply absorbing true-crime story and a trenchant social critique. About the Author: T. Christian Miller joined ProPublica as a senior reporter in 2008. Before that, he worked for the Los Angeles Times, where he covered politics and wars, and was once kidnapped by leftist guerrillas in Colombia. Ken Armstrong, who joined ProPublica in 2017, previously worked at the Marshall Project and the Chicago Tribune, where his work helped prompt the Illinois governor to suspend executions and empty death row. They have both been awarded numerous prizes, including the Pulitzer. The Marshall Project Wins A Pulitzer Prize. Ken Armstrong of The Marshall Project and T. Christian Miller of ProPublica have been awarded a 2016 Pulitzer Prize for their joint reporting project, “An Unbelievable Story of Rape.” Tom Robbins of The Marshall Project was also named a Pulitzer finalist in the investigative reporting category for his series with New York Times writers Michael Winerip and Michael Schwirtz on the culture of violence in upstate New York prisons. This is the first Pulitzer for The Marshall Project, a nonprofit news organization with a staff of 25. Launched in November 2014, The Marshall Project’s mission is to create and sustain a sense of urgency about the U.S. criminal justice system through non-partisan journalism. “Armstrong and Miller’s article about a rape that was not believed, and the stories by Tom Robbins, Michael Winerip and Michael Schwirtz on guard abuse in New York State, underscore the critical role the press can play in launching public discourse about our system of crime and punishment.” said Neil Barsky, TMP’s chairman and founder. “I’m proud of the role The Marshall Project, under the leadership of Bill Keller, is playing in bringing these stories to light.” “The rape story and the articles on prison brutality remind us that — in a time of shrinking attention spans — deep, patient reporting and great storytelling can win readers and bring results,” said Bill Keller, TMP’s editor-in-chief. “This work also reinforces the growing sense that journalistic collaboration is, to borrow a military term, a force multiplier.” “An Unbelievable Story of Rape” is the account of a failed police investigation and the trail of hurt and humiliation that followed. This 12,000-word piece tells the story of a young woman who reported being raped at knifepoint in her apartment, only to be disbelieved by police, and later prosecuted for lying to the authorities. Years later, two relentless female detectives in Colorado arrested a man suspected of raping a series of women and discovered that the original victim was telling the truth all along. The project did not begin as a collaboration. Armstrong and Miller discovered midway through their reporting that they were pursuing the same story from different ends and chose to work together rather than compete. The result is a suspenseful, braided narrative that reveals the best, and worst, of policing. It also explores the corrosive impact of doubt as it spreads within a family and community, which This American Life expanded on in their version of the story, “Anatomy of Doubt.” “Unbelievable” generated an outpouring of reader response, including from educators who said they planned to use the article in instructing police trainees, hospital trauma units and university students in how to deal sensitively with rape victims. The Marshall Project was also a finalist for a series with The New York Times on violence in upstate New York prisons. In Attica’s Ghosts, Robbins exposed the brutal beating of an inmate and the culture of impunity that protects the majority of prison guards from consequences for their actions. Subsequent stories revealed the power of the guards union and the near impossibility of firing abusive correctional officers. These articles led to meaningful action by state and federal authorities: Investigators are looking into the beatings at Attica (and other prisons); the state is changing the way it tracks inmate complaints to enable officials to identify problem officers more easily; and 500 security cameras were installed at Attica. “An Unbelievable Story of Rape” also won the George Polk Award for justice reporting; the American Society of News Editors (ASNE) Award for nondeadline writing; the Mike Berger Award for in-depth, human interest reporting; and the Al Nakkula Award for police reporting. The story was also a finalist for each of the following: the National Magazine Award for feature writing; the Taylor Family Award for fairness in journalism; and the Dart Award for excellence in coverage of trauma. An earlier version of this story incorrectly identified the category for which Tom Robbins, Michael Winerip and Michael Schwirtz were nominated.