An Unreal Dream: The Michael Morton Story is a documentary film which premiered in 2013. It is about Michael Morton and a case of wrongful conviction which happened in Williamson County, Texas, in the 1980s.
Here is some basic information about this film:
** Director: Al Reinert
** Co-directors: John Dean and Nellie Gonzalez
** Run time: ca 90 minutes
The case begins in August 1986 when Michael is 32. He is married to Christine. Together they have a son Eric, who is three years old. Michael has a good life, but this will not last. The situation will change.
On 13 August 1986, Christine is attacked and killed in the family home, apparently in front of their three-year old son Eric. Michael has lost his wife; and Eric has lost his mother. This is bad. But it gets worse:
The police suspect that Michael is the killer. He is arrested and charged with murder. He claims he is innocent. But this does not help. In 1987, he is tried in a court of law where he is found guilty and sentenced to life in prison. While in prison, he still maintains his innocence.
In 2010, he is offered parole. But there are two important conditions:
(1) He must admit that he is guilty.
(2) He must show remorse for what he did.
He says no. He refuses to lie to get out of prison. He says his innocence is all he has left. He will not surrender. And so he must remain in prison.
In 2011, Michael’s lawyers are finally able to prove that he has been telling the truth all along: he is innocent. He is released from prison and his conviction is vacated. He is exonerated after serving almost 25 years for a crime he did not commit.
In this film, Michael tells us his story and it is done very well. For a man who has lost 25 years of his life, he is surprisingly calm. We see him sitting in a chair in the middle of a large courtroom; the very courtroom where his trial took place in 1987; where he was found guilty and sentenced to life in prison.
The following persons also appear from time to time:
** Eric Olson - Michael’s son, who changed his last name while he was a teenager; in 2013, Eric is 30 years old
** John Raley - Michael’s lawyer in Texas
** Nina Morrison - a lawyer, who works for the New York Innocence Project
** Barry Scheck - a lawyer and co-founder of the New York Innocence Project
When Michael was arrested, he claimed he was innocent, but hardly anybody believed him. He could not help the defence in any way, because he did not know anything about the murder.
He assumed a stranger had entered house and killed his wife. But the police rejected this assumption, stating that it was absurd.
In 1986-1987, while the case was going on, Michael’s lawyer suspected that the police and the prosecution were withholding evidence that might support Michael’s claim of innocence, but he was unable to prove anything.
In 2001, Michael’s lawyer contacted the New York Innocence Project and when the Innocence Project decided to take on the case, the situation began to change (even though the pace of change was painfully slow).
In 2005, lawyers from the Innocence Project made two requests to the district attorney of Williamson County:
(1) They demanded that the DA hand over all documents and notes relating to the original investigation.
(2) They demanded that the physical evidence found at the crime scene be subjected to a DNA-test.
The DA’s office did not want to comply. They stalled as long as they could. After several years all relevant documents and notes were finally handed over.
Among them was a transcript of a conversation between Eric (who was an eyewitness to the murder) and a family member conducted shortly after the event. In this conversation Eric says that “a monster” had killed his mother. He also says that his father was not at home when it happened.
Another document revealed what police officers found out when they interviewed Michael’s neighbours: a green van had been seen parked near the house. Perhaps this van belonged to a stranger who had entered the house?
A third document revealed that Christine’s stolen credit card had been used a few days after the murder and that a forged check with her name had been cashed around the same time.
None of these documents were made available to the defence during the trial. Had they been available, Michael’s lawyer might have used them to show that there was reason to doubt Michael’s guilt.
The police might have investigated the information about the stolen credit card and the forged check. If this had been done, it might have led the police to the real killer. But these leads were ignored by the police and kept secret from the defence.
Back in 1986 and 1987 there was no talk about DNA. At the time this method was not yet available. But it was on the way. The first results of DNA-testing were used around 1990. For six years, the DA of Williamson County refused to allow a DNA-test of the physical evidence. Finally, in 2011, a judge ordered him to hand over the evidence so it could be tested.
When the test was done, they found a match. There was evidence of a third person (neither Christine nor Michael): a stranger who had entered the house and killed Christine. His name was Mark Alan Norwood.
Further testing showed that his DNA was also found at another crime scene: the murder of Debra Baker who was killed in 1988. If the police had found and arrested him in 1986 or 1987, the murder of Debra Baker could have been prevented. Since the police had arrested the wrong man, the real perpetrator was allowed to go free and to commit another violent crime!
What do reviewers say about this film?
On IMDb it has a rating of 76 per cent, which corresponds to (almost) four stars on Amazon.
On the US version of Amazon there are more than 175 reviews of this product. The average rating is 4.7 stars.
If you ask me, the former rating is too low, while the latter is more appropriate. I want to go all the way to the top with this product. I think it deserves a rating of five stars.
PS # 1. Michael Morton tells his story in this book: Getting Life: An Innocent Man’s 25-Year Journey from Prison to Peace (hardcover 2014, paperback 2015).
PS # 2. Ken Anderson was the DA in 1986. In 2013 he was criticized for withholding exculpatory evidence from the defence. He was arrested and served five days of a 10-day sentence. In addition, he had to give up his licence to practice law. This kind of punishment was and is most unusual. In the US, a public prosecutor is almost never punished, even in cases where prosecutorial misconduct is confirmed.
For details, see the following article: Bennett L. Gershman, “Ken Anderson court of inquiry shows prosecutorial misconduct at its worst,” Huff Post, 12 February 2013.
PS # 3. John Bradford was the DA whose refusal to allow DNA-testing of the physical evidence prolonged Michael’s time in prison with six years.
For details, see the following article: Brandi Grissom, “A tough prosecutor finds his certitude shaken by a prisoner’s exoneration,” The Texas Tribune, 18 November 2011.
PS # 4. The following article is available online:
John Levs, “Innocent Man: How Inmate Michael Morton Lost 25 Years of His Life,” CNN News, 4 December 2013.
PS # 5. For information about wrongful convictions in the US, see the following book:
Blind Injustice: A Former Prosecutor Exposes the Psychology and Politics of Wrongful Convictions by Mark Godsey (director of the Ohio Innocence project) (published in 2017).
PS # 6. Outcry is the title of a documentary series which premiered on US television (Showtime) in 2020. It is the story of Greg Kelley (a high school student and a football player) who was accused of sexually molesting a 4-year old child. This case also took place in Williamson County, Texas.
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The cover of Michael Morton's book
(hardcover 2014, paperback 2015)
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