0:03

This is a story about friendship.

0:05

It was this fund that was occurring

0:08

and it was unmistakable, and we were best friends.

0:10

A friendship that bloomed during the hot summer of nineteen

0:13

seventy nine when a famous doctor

0:15

named Jeffrey McDonald and we need lab

0:17

here for barbed level and ABC met

0:20

a famous journalist. Ladies and gentlemen, will you welcome

0:22

please, Joe McGinnis. Joe McGinnis

0:25

named Joe McGinnis. I like Joe. We

0:27

talked about the same things in the New York Knicks,

0:29

the Yankees and the Mets football. Two

0:32

friends who would go jogging together. And

0:34

this was the beginning of the running Room. And you know,

0:36

you sort of get this cover y after a while

0:39

that summer they did just about everything

0:41

together. We drank together.

0:43

I mean we did the classic but a routine

0:46

of all times. And with

0:48

all this time together, Jeff and Joe hatched

0:50

the plan. You see, Jeff have been accused

0:52

of a horrible crime. Reporter Joe McGinnis

0:55

spent three years investigating Jeff McDonald,

0:57

who granted him total access, and Joe

0:59

was going to prove in minicine so that McGinnis

1:01

might write the definitive book about it. It is

1:03

called Fatal Vision. But unfortunately McGinnis

1:06

summarized for us his stunning conclusion.

1:08

It didn't turn out that way. All

1:11

I'm saying is that Jeffrey McDonald beat

1:13

and stabbed to death his pregnant

1:15

wife and his two young daughters. It

1:17

was one of those sensational crimes that attracted

1:20

nationwide attention. I was the first to

1:22

enter the McDonald Some bizarre

1:25

murderers took place last night. There were

1:27

things you'll never forget. The wife and two young

1:29

daughters of Jeffrey McDonald were stabbed

1:31

at death. The first I thought it was homicide, suicide.

1:34

Then he started a move. The truth is going

1:36

to come out. I did not kill my wife. I did not kill

1:38

my children, and that's going to come out in the court A lot did. I

1:40

had jury convicted doctor Jeffrey McDonald

1:43

for murdering his wife and two children.

1:45

McDonald was sentenced to three life terms

1:47

in prison. We still,

1:49

at that point had this hope that we hadn't

1:51

been incorrect on Joe, that he was going to write

1:54

a good book. This book became the only hope

1:56

of some kind of indication. Exactly Joe

1:59

McGinnis is woven McDonald's story

2:01

into a book called Fatal Vision. Joe's

2:03

book Fatal Vision didn't just say that Jeffrey

2:06

McDonald had killed his wife and children. You uncovered

2:08

some facts that even the prosecution didn't.

2:11

The book had drugs, Mike, there's no question

2:13

as a possibility that I took to pill at

2:15

speed and sex. Jeffrey McDonald

2:18

had seventeen mistresses, he

2:20

was a slut. What has he had to do with whether I

2:22

committed a triple hibside Fatal Vision

2:24

became a huge hit. I can never overcome

2:27

Fatal Vision and Jeff's worst nightmare.

2:29

I cannot prove that I

2:31

am not that monster. But

2:34

for Joe McGuinness, you did this with a cooperation

2:36

of Dr Jeffrey McDonald questions about

2:38

his journalistic ethics. Should you have told him

2:40

that you have found him in your own heart of hearts

2:43

guilty? Who made the book his worst

2:45

nightmare too? There's no reasons you can find some him.

2:47

The job of a writer is to write the book. Was

2:50

the real villain of Fatal Vision? It's protagonist,

2:52

Jeffrey McDonald's a psychopath. He

2:55

has no remorse, no conscience or its

2:57

author He was going to my mother, who was

2:59

dying in saying don't worry. When the book

3:01

comes out, this will all be righted. For Joe.

3:03

Getting close to jeff was a necessary

3:06

evil. My only ambition was to

3:08

learn the truth and then to tell it. But

3:10

had Joe even found the truth? A

3:12

federal appeals court today reversed the

3:14

murder convictions of Jeffrey McDonald

3:17

in the slayings of his pregnant wife and two

3:19

young daughters. Is what Joe McCann

3:21

has did morally indefensible,

3:24

That's what I want to find out. I'm

3:26

Mark Smirling from the Jinks in Crime Town

3:28

and this is my new podcast, Morally

3:30

Indefensible. This season will

3:32

take a close look at the friendship between a true

3:34

crime writer and a convicted killer and

3:37

the book that ruined both their lives.

3:39

Either this is the most horrible, merciless,

3:42

brutal killer on the face of the earth or

3:44

one of the most victimized men in American

3:46

legal history. Morally Indefensible

3:48

is presented by Effects Networks new docuseries

3:51

A Wilderness of Error, and will be coming

3:53

soon to Apple Podcasts or wherever

3:55

you get your podcasts.