Throughout these four episodes, Madison Hamburg, and us, learned the truth about the life Barbara Hamburg really lived - that she was a recovering alcoholic who, at the . Barbara was found dead on the morning of March 3, 2010, in the yard of her rental house on Middle Beach Road in Madison, Conn. Police responded at 11:25 a.m. to a 911 call reporting an injured . But they're in a really good spot now. Who called Barbara to tell her that her court time had been changed from 9:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. the day of her murder (ostensibly making time for the crime to be committed)? They successfully appealed to the Connecticuts Freedom of Information Commission, which ruled last year the police department had to turn over its files free of charge to the pair. It's terrifying, and I think that something that was really important for me was naming and identifying the adverse effects of doing something like this in the documentary itself, because I just think that's one of the unique aspects of the point of view. Her cover photo, quite fittingly, is one of her and Barbara, and the first thing youd see when you go to her profile is the headline GRATEFUL Conway may not have a concrete alibi for her sisters murder, but no one can deny that she loved and still misses her. But just because the finale has aired, that doesn't mean the story is over. If I didn't ask these questions, the questions would go unasked, but I've tried my hardest to do this what I consider the right way. Precisely how much time should pass between a case going cold and when the files should be accessible to the public is up for debate, Klau conceded, but he kicked that decision to the legislature, arguing state lawmakers are in the best position to set out in writing a clear timeframe for when and how such records should be made available. If you say youre going to keep a file closed forever on the chance that something might develop, that means the public in most cases will never get to look at these files, Schulz said Friday. The courts justices challenged both Dugas and Harmon with questions. But one thing that surprised meI remember the first message I got after the release of episode one. After the Police Department appealed a commission order to the release the records, a trial court in August 2021 upheld the commissions decision. In a genre that so often luridly dehumanizes its victims, specifically women, as a means for salacious storytelling, "Murder on Middle Beach" is less about clinically dismantling family secrets for their evidentiary value, than it is about assessing how those family secrets bond and tie us and what it means when those bonds are severed. When her body was found by her sister and daughter it was covered with outdoor furniture cushions. You watched the last time I talked to my dad. But Murder on Middle Beach is not a normal documentary. This was actually where the four-part series began, as first-time filmmaker Madison Hamburg set out to investigate the events surrounding the murder of his mother, Barbara Beach Hamburg, who was . Do you know who did it? When my mom died, I took a year off from school. His father, Jeffrey Hamburg, quickly became a person of interest. Upon hearing this new information, Beach alters her opinion of Ali as the murderer. Due to Conway's addiction, she lost custody of her son to Barbara, after which Conway attempted to hire a hitman to kill Barbara because she "snapped. Madison Hamburg, right, during a candlelight vigil and memorial service for his mother, Madison resident Barbara Hamburg, a 2010 slaying victim in an unsolved case, at the First Congregational Church in Madison on Feb. 29, 2020. Copyright 2023 Design by Julia Balfour, LLC, Federal Grant will Help Stamford Police Catch Auto Thieves, Hundreds of Elevator Malfunctions in Stamford and No Clear Fix, With Ambulance Response Times of as Much as 40 Minutes, Legislators Propose a Funding Fix, Researchers Target Housing in Pilot Program to Reduce Gun Violence, Firefighter in Rehab Calls on Department Leaders to Bolster Brotherhood, As More Weapons are Brought to Schools, Parents and Administrators Seek a Safe Path Forward. However, later in the documentary, director Madison Hamburg Barbara's son and Ali's brother obtains school records that corroborate Ali's alibi of being at school at the time of the murder. The matter now is in the hands of the Connecticut Supreme Court, which heard oral arguments Wednesday. One issue that was resolved in the documentary was the status of Ali Hamburg, Madison's sister and the daughter of Barbara, as a potential suspect in the case. He said it was also important to preserve the rights of victims and family members, who he said he didnt believe would want information released while police officers were still working on their case. But the uncomfortable history between the two made Conway come under scrutiny for her murder. She. Instead, we're left with questions. Like I really didn't want to create caricatures of my family members. While her murder and its aftermath are explored on the show, it also paints a vivid portrait of who Beach Hamburg was before her death, and how her family is managing to cope with their loss 10 years later. The Madison Police Department is appealing a court ruling upholing an order by the states Freedom of Information Commission that the department release all records except signed witness statements related to the unsolved murder of Barbara Beach Hamburg. It would compromise the case investigation. he said. In 2010, Barbara Beach Hamburg was found bludgeoned in her yard next to the golf course in Madison, Connecticut. The resulting documentary series was picked up by HBO, and the four-part Murder on Middle Beach premiered late last year. HBO. In the height of his grief, he decided he could use his medium of choicefilmto memorialize her, and also explore who she really was, who might have wanted to hurt her, and why. We work on this case weekly, we have a states attorney assigned to us who works on this weekly. There's a double-edged sword in the fact that the episodes are released weekly. It's also worth noting that at the time of Barbara's murder, she was set to receive $40,000 from her latest table, as the doc alleges. Since 2016 there have been multiple cold case reviews and none of those reviews have turned up a new avenue of investigation, a new lead to follow or new steps to take, she said. Her body was discovered by Madison's aunt Conway and his sister, Ali. It's revealed in the "Murder on Middle Beach" epilogue that in October 2020, Madison was granted that case file and that he and his team had started reviewing it for additional information about the murder. It's unknown just how many people Barbara had under her at the Gifting Tables, but she was accused of recruiting members from her AA group. ", "It wasn't a story about a murder, it's a story about identity and about my mom and that's a really hard sell," he told the Connecticut Insider. She frequently cried when talking about her sister, and more than once, displayed anger towards what happened. The case was then brought to trial in the Superior Court of New Britain, which last month upheld the Freedom of Information Commissions ruling. June 3, 2021 8:00AM. She was a woman who was known to be head-strong. Because of the case's mysterious nature, the Internet is full of theories pondering who killed Barbara Hamburg. Here are the most notable suspects. So I pressed everyone pretty hard, and I ended up with 160 hours of footage. And we ended up pitching to Lisa Heller, who was one of our last pitches at HBO and it was just incredibly emotional. How Did Barbara Hamburg Die? Over the course of the docuseries, which began as a student film when Madison was in college, Madison says that he has a few goals. Madison police have not yet filed a brief outlining the grounds of their appeal with the Appellate Court, and attempts to reach the department this past week were unsuccessful. Jeffrey, who was an exorbitantly wealthy former CEO of Southern Electric International, and Barbara had an incredibly acrimonious divorce. On March 3, 2010, Barbara Beach Hamburg was found dead in her Connecticut house. Drumm said in the meeting that, along with the request from Madison Hamburg and Neimeyer, the department had received three other requests from media outlets from the other coast for the full case files. There was no stone they had left unturned.. That's a question that I've asked myself a lot. Police never made an arrest in the case, though Floyd Dugas, the attorney representing the department in the records dispute, told the court Wednesday the agency long has had a prime suspect. I was most worried about Conway throughout this whole process and I think she's in a good spot. The story sort of chronicles and parallels my journey in making this. Murder on Middle Beach Season 2 Release Date 'Murder on Middle Beach' season 1 premiered on November 15, 2020, on HBO, and concluded with its fourth and final episode - 'Reasonable Doubts' - on December 6, 2020. The medical examiner later ruled her death a homicide, noting that she died as a result of "multiple blunt and sharp force injury.". Attorney David Schulz, a Yale Law professor and member of the schools Media Freedom and Information Access Clinic that has worked with Hamburg and Niemeyer on the records fight, called Klaus decision thorough and thoughtful. He agreed the eventual conclusion of this case could help set new precedent for how the public access old police case files across the state, which is an important tool for holding investigators accountable, he said. In late December, Niemeyer filed another complaint with the FOIC over the missing records, and the department responded by appealing the commissions original order to release any of the documents in the first place. Retracing the path of controversial Project Veritas founder James O'Keefe includes many stops in Connecticut. While waiting for the person to arrive, she grabs a drink at the lobby bar. The. According to the doc, Jeffrey allegedly owed Barbara and their two children hundreds of thousands of dollars, and the two were due to appear in court together on the day Barbara was murdered to sort it out. November 30, 2020. One suspect was definitively eliminated from consideration. Do we need a case to be closed, or at least a prime suspect in view, to feel like a narrative arc was actually achieved before the final end credits? The department did turn over two full boxes of documents to Hamburg and Niemeyer in October 2020, but the filmmakers alerted investigators in early November that dozens of files were apparently missing from those records. The Madison Department of Police filed an appeal on September 2. Beach denies this, too. The filmmakers appealed to the states Freedom of Information Commission, which reviews public records disputes. He also works to eliminate several of his family members as potential suspects in his mother's murder. Jeffrey appears in Murder on Middle Beach where he repeatedly refuses to talk about Barbara's murder and insists that his ex-wife had dark secrets that he can't discuss. In the following years, they appeared in court together numerous times after Beach Hamburg said her ex-husband failed to make alimony and child support payments. There was sort of shame attached to that, telling someone that with the connotations around murder and true crime. Its been twelve and a half years since my mother was killed, he said. That's essentially a thousand more opportunities to discover not just what happened to his mother, but to find another slash in the family tree. "My parents told me that . Unfortunately, because of that, when her parents divorced in 2002, she suffered the most. On the other hand, Dugas, the attorney for the Madison Police Department, argued the case was very much active. We now know they have that information, which led them to ask additional questions of us of information that we had not shared with the general public, Drumm told commissioners, adding that the department needed to retain the information to complete its investigation. By subscribing to this BDG newsletter, you agree to our. Conway presents the situation like she simply was scammed; she and Barbara eventually came to terms, and Conway moved in with her prior to the murder (though the docuseries alleges that there was tension between the two because Barbara had asked her to move out). A spokesperson for the Connecticut State Police Public Information Office said the State Police had not released any evidence regarding the murder of Barbara Hamburg. The only way we can have oversight or accountability for law enforcement is to know what theyre doing.. If a department cannot show there is a prospective law enforcement action and that disclosure of the records would be prejudicial to such an action, then the publics right to access the records wins out, Harmon said, arguing the Madison Police Department failed to meet its burden of proof in this case. I was a drug addict at the time, and really fell into my addiction and hit my rock bottom. 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