Long Shot (2017) Online

On the front of the law library building near to where I live there is the famous quote, written in both French and English - It says "Leave no stone unturned". The French is "Remuer ciel et terre", literally, "shake up the sky and the earth". What happens in this documentary is closer to the sky than the earth. It is perhaps the alignment of stars, something inexplicable intertwined with something very human. If you're reading this you probably already know it's a documentary about a man who was accused of a murder. I won't say anything further because it really is quite the story, of people and actions that came together, intentionally and unintentionally.

I think we all get really upset when we find out an innocent man is convicted of a crime. The upset many times turns to outrage if the innocent party has been railroaded by law enforcement. I think most folks who never have any first hand contact with such have believed this almost never happens. Since the proliferation of a diverse number of real crime related shows this perception has been totally blown up.. There has been a whole generation of law enforcement who use very questionable tactics in order to achieve outcomes pre-determined must be. It's easy to blame "bad cops", but it's a generational thing that has morphed into what it is by being handed down to younger officers with only the admonition that it was successful before. One wonders if not for many innocently convicted people ultimately being exonerated through DNA and various other methods if this abuse would have just festered further?

Something else...science has now proved eye-witness testimony to be deeply flawed even immediately after an event and much more flawed over even modest amounts of time. This is how Juan Catalan came to be arrested for a murder for which he couldn't have possibly committed as he was no where near the actual murder scene. Police were totally convinced Catalan was lying and they chose to attempt to railroad him into admitting to a crime he did not do which he steadfastly denied. The zeal of the police should have at the least been professionally tempered as they came to believe Calalan was the killer just from a questionable witness and composite picture. The zeal only fed off the zeal of the prosecutor who had never lost a murder case. All of this made it look as if Catalan was heading for a conviction and a possible death sentence.

Sometimes justice is served against long odds. It often takes a bit of several serendipitous things all aligning. Catalan got a lawyer who zeroed in on proving his client was at a Dodger's game. Thus he needed something close to irrefutable which was proving hard to pin down since out of 57,000 people it becomes hard for strangers to remember strangers. That did not stop the attorney and in his never give up attitude something kind of miraculous happened. When the stadiums film showed Catalan at the game it was too blurry to be convincing beyond doubt things looked hardly better. However on that day there was some other video that existed. So rare was it that it only existed for the day in question only. But could it have what the defense needed?

Larry David's hit HBO show called Curb Your Enthusiasm was taping in the stadium and as it would turn out the very proof Catalan needed to prove Catalan waste the game...it was in the footage for this show. Almost beyond belief Larry David shares filmed frames with Catalan.

The final piece of making the case for Catalan's innocence was the timecode on the film which is the actual time of day. Here's the shocking bottom line: Juan Catalan may well be in prison for the rest of his life if not for the show Curb Your Enthusiasm. But wait...the time code wasn't late enough to absolutely and irrefutably put Catalan at the Dodger's game late enough Enter cell phone pinging. This will end up corroborating Catalan's presence at the stadium late enough to be convincing. So glad justice was righted here. But, we should all be outraged and incensed as the mechanism of justice isn't suppose to be pure chance. Things still must change to raise the quality of the entire justice system from the moment the badge goes on the the final sound of the gavel in the courtroom.

First I applaud the judge as her weighing of the truth was impeccable and 100% moral. I admonish the prosecutor and the detectives as they went with flawed evidence and pushed it to the extreme. We need more people in the chain of law like this wonderful judge and the unflappable and truth committed defense attorney. I finally give the makers of this documentary my highest praise. They made a dark turn of events into a very informative and entertaining film with an ending that was uplifting. See Long Shot!

I'm so used to the subjects of these documentaries still being in jail fighting. Which I assume the purpose of the films is to bring attention to their cases. I figured this would be the same. I was so angry through the first half and had little tears of joy by the second. But I honestly think the cell phone tower could've been enough to have his charges dismissed. Good story though

1/9/18. Juan Catalan was lucky he went to see the Dodgers at the stadium. He was lucky the Curb Your Enthusiasm crew was filming an episode at the stadium that caught him on camera. He was lucky the phone company tracked his cellphone calls so he could be located on the grid. Lucky, lucky, lucky. Makes you wonder what would have happened to poor Juan if he wasn't this lucky.

Possibly the best short film I have seen in years. Exciting, suspenseful, quick paced, full of stars, villains, energy. Everything you would want from a thriller. I think everyone who has any interest in justice, criminal or otherwise would be satisfied by this 40 minute thrill ride.

He system is so corrupt and filled with holes. And I really sat here praying and wishing so hard that that prosecutor Silverman one day will get hers, that she herself or one of her children will have to go through something like this. Just for her to know..to feel what it's like. She made me nauseous the way she looked the way she acted. A criminal ironically locking up innocent people. And there are probably millions of other people in the word like her. The system is flawed..in many, many ways. It made me so mad and most of all sad.

The term 'Miscarriage of Justice' seems to have been invented to fit this case: Juan Catalan was arrested, charged with murder, held for 5 months then arraigned for the murder. Luckily Juan had a good defense attorney. The attorney discovered that the day when the murder occurred, Juan and his daughter were at the Dodgers/Braves baseball game. The attorney was able to prove this because an episode of HBO's 'Curb Your Enthusiasm' was being filmed at the game. When the attorney checked the outtakes, Juan and his daughter were seen at the game. But even more, Juan successfully sued the police department for police misconduct and won.

"Long Shot" is an American 40-minute documentary from September 2017, so this one is only about a month old and has made quite some waves already that you could say that this Netflix production is among the earliest contenders for the 2018 Best Documentary Short Oscar. It was directed by Jacob LaMendola and tells the story of Juan Catalan who was accused of murdering a witness from his brother's trial through a shot to the head. And while early on, there is still a bit of an element of suspense, the longer it runs the more obvious it becomes that he did not commit said crime. His alibi is that he was at a baseball game when it happened and what a coincidence that the hit show Curb Your Enthusiasm was just filming there and got him on tape to confirm his alibi. Phone recordings help his matter too.

I personally enjoyed the watch here from start to finish. It may not have made the emotional impact on me as it made on others, but that's just subjective I guess. And who knows maybe he'd even have been acquitted had he stayed at home. I maybe would have hoped for a more in-depth explanation about why he would have killed the lady in the first place. They never really offer a motive, on the contrary actually as it doesn't sound like her testimony was crucial against the brother. Anyway, it's hard for me to believe the protagonist here could have been convicted based on a drawing that looks like him and honestly a small patch of chin hair just cannot be enough. I guess they would have included that if it had been a 90-minute film we got here. But yeah, it is a lot shorter and if you didn't know already: Larry David can save your life. What a coincidence. Makes me curious about the new CYE season that will be released soon. But back to these 40 minutes here: I think you may want to check these out as it is a fairly interesting story that they elaborate on in here. I give it a thumbs-up.