You Can’t Make This Up

Happy New Year! We are so ready to jump into 2021 but before we do, we want to take a look back at 2020. It really was a year of 'You Can’t Make This Up' moments, and the true-crime titles and conversations were no different. Netflix filmmakers and documentarians consistently delivered original content that intrigued and surprised. They forced viewers to take a second look at crimes that we thought we knew all about from news reports and pop culture...

In the early 1980s, the crack epidemic tore through America like a tsunami, ravaging all in its wake. And the destructive effects on people's lives, families, and communities are still deeply felt decades later. “Crack: Cocaine, Corruption & Conspiracy” examines the drug’s devastation, shadowy origins, and the ongoing criminalization of Black and Brown people in U.S. prison and healthcare systems. Rebecca speaks with director Stanley Nelson. This episode contains spoilers...

The mid-1980s was a period of terror in Southern California. A series of random home invasions, sexual assaults, and brutal murders were happening across the region. Men, women, and children of all races and walks of life were victims. Stranger yet, the horrendous methods of killings fit no particular pattern. Some victims were strangled. Some were shot. Some were beaten to death...

It was the late 1970s. A serial killer known as the Yorkshire Ripper cast a dark shadow over the lives of women across England. Over a span of five years, thirteen women were dead and the police seemed incapable of catching the murderer. No one felt safe – and every man was a suspect.

For nearly a century, the Cecil Hotel in downtown Los Angeles has been linked to some of the city’s most notorious activity — from untimely deaths to housing serial killers. In 2013, college student Elisa Lam vanished while staying as a guest at the hotel. Her disappearance ignited a media frenzy that mobilized a global community of internet sleuths eager to solve the case...

A note to listeners: This episode contains spoilers. So make sure to watch the entire series and then, listen on. In Salt Lake City in 1985, a trio of pipe bombings killed two people. The murders sent shockwaves through the Mormon Church when a trove of historically controversial Latter-Day Saints letters was found destroyed in the vehicle of the third victim, a renowned collector of rare documents. As he fights for his life, investigators raced to uncover the truth...

You’ve probably heard a lot about the 2019 college admission scandal, but you haven’t heard everything. Operation Varsity Blues goes beyond the celebrity-driven headlines with real conversations from FBI wiretaps. The film offers a rare glimpse of the man at the center of the scandal,  Rick Singer, and the methods he used to help his wealthy clients cheat a system already designed to benefit the privileged...

In 1990, two men dressed as cops conned their way into a Boston museum and stole a fortune in art. The stolen works are estimated to be worth over half a billion dollars today and there’s a 10 million dollar reward for whoever finds it. “This is A Robbery: The World’s Greatest Art Heist” goes deep into the leads, dead ends, lucky breaks, and speculations surrounding this notorious crime that remains unsolved over 30 years later...

On today’s show, we’re taking a break from our usual format to premiere a new original Netflix podcast: “Searching for The Sons of Sam.” From Tenderfoot TV and true crime director Joshua Zeman comes a 5-part audio documentary about Zeman’s relationship with the late journalist Maury Terry. Terry spent 40 years of his life trying to prove that convicted Son of Sam serial killer David Berkowitz had not acted alone...

This episode contains spoilers so make sure to watch all of the film "Why Did You Kill Me?" on Netflix before listening on. After her daughter’s murder, a mother uses the social networking site MySpace to find the people she believes are responsible. She creates a fake profile that leads to unexpected intimacy with the suspects, a key break in the case, and a dark revenge plot...