A Historian at the Cinema: West of Memphis

We learn from our history, but we generally suffer from a forgetful memory. The case of the West Memphis Three is a painful lesson in injustice and mass hysteria. The case began with the horrific murder of three young boys in West Memphis. The crime rightfully shocked the community and calls to bring the culprits to justice were immediate. It is important to state that this was a tragic and horrific crime. The victims and their families deserve justice. However, in the process of solving this crime, social fears of outsiders and alleged deviants overruled proper police work and legal proceedings. West of Memphis, a film by Amy Berg, documents the tragedy of both crimes, the homicide and the legal injustice committed upon the West Memphis Three.

Three young men, Damien Echolls, Jason Bradley, and Jessie Misskelley, known for their love of heavy metal, anti-social behavior, and lack of assimilation with the conservative town, where quickly pointed to by the community as the perpetrators. Prosecutors and police conducted a what can now be called biased and flimsy investigation that sought more to appease the towns prejudice than actual justice. The result of the investigation and trial was the conviction of the three boys, now known as the West Memphis Three. The tragedy of the murders were only compounded by the tragedy of unjust conviction.

Amy Berg's film follows the investigation and carefully analyzes the mistakes and missteps made by police and prosecutors. Suspects that were quickly dismissed without due dilligance and the eventual convicted teens who were treated in a manner that borders on criminal manipulation. However, Amy Berg is careful in her analysis. She does not fall into the trap of placing generalized blame on the community, recognizing that the murders were indeed horrific and it is hard to blame parents for passionately searching for their son's killers. The parents are treated with respect and humanity. Her harshest criticism are reserved for the investigators and prosecutors who were more interested in expediency than truth.

However, the heart of the film is the calls for justice after the trial. Amy Berg focuses on the arduous and complex process of asking for repeals and clemency by the West Memphis Three. By this point, the teens were no longer alone in their crusade for justice, celebrities, activists, and regular people had rallied around the West Memphis Three. Concerts, protests, rallies and fund raisers were organized to show solidarity with the teens and bring their cause national attention. Despite the case garnering national media attention, time after time their appeals were denied and rejected. No amount of public support or evidence of police incompetence seemed to sway the court's or the Governor's mind. The cause seemed lost until 2011. Negotiations between the no longer teens and now men's attorney and prosecutors resulted in an Alford Plea Bargain. In non legal speak, this meant they would enter a plea deal that allowed them to assert their innocence but acknowledged that prosecutors had enough evidence to convict. They were released with suspended sentences.

Is this justice? The film takes a strong position in declaring no.The amount of back and forth, rejection after rejection that Echolls, Bradley, and Misskelley were subjected to can not be called justice in my opinion. From the first day of the investigation they were deemed guilty and never given any defense. This film depicts the scary reality of the U.S justice system gone array, and demonstrates that it is often done without much push back. Berg asks the audience to examine how we as a society react to crimes. There is a sense of balance that needs to preserved. Justice to the victim and to the accused. However, it is often harder to understand justice for the accused than for the victims.

Guatavita and El Dorado

The trip that I had been most excited for since I got our plane tickets was this one. It is the origin of the myth that almost everyone is familiar with, El Dorado. El Dorado, or the Golden One, was the idea that brought Spanish conquistadors to the Americas. It drove them violently mad and fueled their cross continent treks to find the sacred site and claim it for the Spanish crown. As one would expect, the myth was more a creation of Spaniards than it was of the natives. The tiny grain of truth in the myth was massively embellished and misconstrued by greedy Europeans looking for what they believed to be rightfully theirs.

This lake is so far up in the mountains the climate is
actually different than the base. 

About an hours drive from Bogota and through a badly maintained dirt road you will reach the Guatavita Park. The drive and early morning start is worth the trip. Entry to the park includes a guided tour to the top of the lake which lasts about an hour and a half. On the way to the top you will learn about the culture of the Muisca including their agriculture, their religious practices, their political structure and other interesting aspects about this not so well known culture. It is important to note here the importance of gold to the Muisca, which is why I recommend visiting the Gold Museum prior to visiting Guatavita. Although the tour includes a visit to a reconstructed ceremonial house with photos of typical gold offerings, it is much better to see them in person at the museum to better understand the quantity and beauty of these offerings.

The connection between "El Dorado" and Guatavita goes back to the earliest days of Spanish conquest and exploration of the Americas. Nobody is sure where the original reference can be found but rumors of a bath of gold began to circulate among the Spanish. Stories of a place so innundated with gold that the locals were bathing in the precious metal caught the imagination of Spaniards looking to enrich themselves and their nation. The stories grew and turned into a tale of a city of gold, where the inhabitants wore, bathed in, ate out of, and used for every other purpose the fantastic amount of gold available in the Americas. The truth of "El Dorado" is found somewhere within these rumors.

As we begun to ascend the mountain, our tour guide stopped to explain a rather deep pass in the mountain called "El Dolor de los Muisca" or the Pain of the Muisca. Committed by Spanish conquistadors looking for gold, it is evidence of just how deep they were in gold mania. When the Spanish arrived to what is now Colombia, they were always looking for the alleged city of "El Dorado." Following rumors and information obtain from the indigienous populations, the Spaniards found their way to Guatavita. The reality of this "city of gold" was different than the gold platted metropolis they had imagined. Guatavita was a lake, high up in the mountains, that held ceremonial and religious importance. It was here were new village leaders would be trained and prepared to lead ceremonies in which the leader would be dressed in gold and descend into the lake water where he would initiate the gold offerings to the gods. This "bathing" of gold may have been what sparked the rumors of gold baths by the Spanish. After the "cacique" or leader, finished offering his gold adornments to the gods, the rest of the village would begin throwing their offerings over their shoulders into the lake.

The current day pueblo of Guatavita that is definitely worth
visiting once you make it back down the mountain.

The Spanish were insistent in their efforts to "reclaim" the gold in the lake and began a process of draining the lake with buckets. After three months of labor and little results, the Spanish gave up on this manner of claiming the gold. Their next idea would give the ravine its name. Using enslaved natives, the Spanish began a project of breaking part of the mountain to drain the lake. The Muisca people were forced to demolish and desecrate their honored lake and pathway to their gods. Draining the lake resulted in thousands of pounds of precious gold and emeralds being removed from the lake. Despite finding thousands of pounds, the Spanish wanted more. The construction of the ravine continued for decades.

Moving forward to the nineteenth and twentieth century, the lake was once again the subject of foriegn attempts to remove its riches. German and English mining companies offered to help Colombia excavate the lake for archaeological and hydrological purposes. This time using underground tunnels to find objects closer to the center of the lake, German and English explorers found even more gold and rare emeralds (Colombian emeralds are considered some of the finest in the world). Still using the cleared land area that the Spanish had created hundreds of years before, the mining expeditions would come to a sudden end. As our tour guide liked to remind us, the earth remembers and recovers. That ravine, once a sign of pain and exploitation, would become the site of a major rock slide.

It was an amazing experience to see where the gold that Colombia is famous for came from and the heartbreaking history of its exploitation during the Conquest. If you can survive the drive and the hike, I highly recommend it. It gives you a totally new appreciation for the Muisca way of life and the meaning of gold in Colombian history.