The sentencing and eventual exoneration of the Beatrice Six

In Late Edition: Crime Beat Chronicles, we introduce you to the Lincoln Journal Stars’ published Presumed Guilty series, an award-winning examination of the case from 2009. Later in 2019, the project was adapted for a podcast, Revisiting the Case hosted by Elizabeth Rembert. This is part two of an abridged rerelease of the Presumed Guilty podcast.

We pick up with six people behind bars for the 1985 murder and rape of Helen Wilson. Six innocent people set to serve a combined 70 years. In this episode, find out how things played out in the courtroom, with defendants turning on each other with their testimonies in 1989.

Thanks to DNA evidence, the six convicted of the crime in 1989 were exonerated in 2008, and in March of 2023, Gage County completed its payoff to the Beatrice Six (or their estates)-- a total payoff of around $30 million once attorneys' fees were added. 

Read more on the case here. 

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Late Edition: Crime Beat Chronicles, a product of Lee Enterprises, is a collection of limited anthology style episodes exploring true stories as told by journalists from regional newspapers around America.