Beach denies this, too. Jeffrey, who was an exorbitantly wealthy former CEO of Southern Electric International, and Barbara had an incredibly acrimonious divorce. I think that when my mom died and I went to rehab and I decided to face a life without her, I made a decision that day that I was gonna live with as little regret as possible. The case raises questions about exactly when a cold case is considered cold enough to release the investigative files publicly and likely is destined for much further debate by both the judiciary and general assembly, Klau reasoned. But first here are the facts: According to the doc, Barbara Hamburg was a 48-year-old single mother who was bludgeoned and stabbed to death in the front yard of her Madison, CT home on the morning of March 3, 2010. The case was then brought to trial in the Superior Court of New Britain, which last month upheld the Freedom of Information Commissions ruling. Once this financially-strapped individual realized she couldn't get her money back, the individual or perhaps the individual's angered husband, as Beach claims to have seen a masked man prowling through Barbara's yard the day before the murder opted to take out their frustrations on Barbara in a violent manner. It would not be in the interest of our own investigation to release it any further, said Drumm. It was a really tough thing to balance with telling a compelling story, but I think it was knowing that the goal was to subvert the genre in a way, to lean in to those more kind of compelling conventions in order to eventually break them. CT DOT faces criticism following overnight tree-cutting, Haar: Payouts at fading CT trash agency offer lessons in a crisis, State nursing homes could face fine due to too many empty beds, CT legislators revive debate over firefighters' cancer benefits. So I was at film school when my mom died, in this doc class, and I told my immediate group. The court has attempted to resolve a long unsettled question about the degree of certainty concerning a prospective law enforcement action that is required to withhold records. 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. 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. At the time of her death, Beach Hamburg had primary custody of Madison and Ali, while their father received visitation rights. It's something that I've been dealing with throughout this process since partnering with HBO last year, but the idea that this was going to be in the public eye and that these vulnerabilities that my family has trusted me with were going to be exposed didn't enter the equation until the stage was realized. Seeking a way out of making those payments or seeing the inside of a jail cell could allegedly have been a motive for Jeffrey to kill Barbara. Barbara's sister, Conway Beach, makes a number of accusations in the series accusing Ali of murdering her mother, believing she did so before going to school on that day. The dispute over the records goes back to 2019, when Anike Niemeyer, a filmmaker working with Madison Hamburg, requested all the departments investigatory records from the his mothers case. Beach Hamburg and Hamburg married in 1989, but divorced in 2002. The personal gruesomeness of the murder and covering her body like he regrets it feels too personal to be a hit man. Klau reviewed the case and found in August that the police department cannot use the mere theoretical possibility of a future law enforcement action to keep the investigative files secret but conceded there is little precedent for how investigators or the FOIC should determine what constitutes such a future action. 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? Barbara Hamburg was found murdered outside her familys Middle Beach Road home on March 3, 2010, but the case went cold and no one has ever been charged in connection with her death. Emilia Otte covers health and education for the Connecticut Examiner. The horrific 2010 murder of 48-year-old single mom Barbara Hamburg in front of her Madison, Connecticut, home remains unsolved, but there have been plenty of theories as to who could have. 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. On March 3, 2010, Barbara Beach Hamburg, 48, was found murdered in the backyard of her Madison, Connecticut, home. SALON is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office as a trademark of Salon.com, LLC. Before joining the Register, she worked on an independent journalism project about migration in Berlin, Germany. A list of additional records submitted to the court includes surveillance video, recordings of specific voicemails, non-police tape-recorded conversations and copies of items seized from Barbara Hamburgs bedroom safe. Where homicides involved I think the interest is too great not to err on the side of not disclosing.. That means that if you have a victim of a crime in your household tomorrow, they could start [submitting Freedom of Information Requests for] each and every single day in the investigation, said Drumm. Madison police step up fight to withhold, Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window), Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window), Madison police step up fight to withhold Barbara Hamburg murder investigation files from HBOs Murder on Middle Beach filmmakers, Police track shooting suspect by following his footprints in snow in Bloomfield, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy defends giving Fox host Tucker Carlson Jan. 6 footage access, You cant trust sleep advice found on YouTube: study, Tom Sizemores family deciding end of life matters after actor suffers brain aneurysm, Do Not Sell/Share My Personal Information. He said the Board of Selectmen would have to determine how much the town was willing to spend on the lawsuit.Downing expressed hope that state agencies would take up the case and relieve the town of a potentially significant financial burden appealing the case. Here's everything you need to know about Beach Hamburg's death and "Murder on Middle Beach.". The courts justices challenged both Dugas and Harmon with questions. During the last four minutes of of HBO's docuseries "Murder on Middle Beach," a black screen pops up with a single, heartwrenching sentence: My family still lives without answers about my mother's death. Not looking into my mom's story would be the biggest regret of my life, so I don't know that I would do anything differently. So I pressed everyone pretty hard, and I ended up with 160 hours of footage. Evidence of a struggle was strewn across the lawn. As manager of this memorial you can add or update the memorial using the Edit button below. So many people had the opportunity, the motive, the means. You can watch the trailer below. And, as Jeffrey alleged via a phone call to Madison, is there any evidence that the documents detailing his financial decisions had been fabricated? However, when law enforcement has effectively exhausted all efforts to arrest and prosecute a suspect, and when the statistical data show that the probability of a prosecution resulting from long-unsolved cases approaches zero, it is difficult to understand how denying public access to criminal investigation files in perpetuity serves the public interest in solving crimes and bringing perpetrators to justice. 7: Caught in a Bad Romance, Brandon Sklenar is the Baddest Dutton of Them All, The 'Outer Banks' S3 Finale Is Intense as Hell. We certainly dont want to give a heads-up or give away some information that only somebody who was at the scene or perpetrated the crime would know.. Conway and Ali are the ones who discovered the body and Conway said Ali acted "strangely." Dowling said the Board of Police Commissioners and the Board of Selectmen were working on setting up a joint meeting, and that the lawsuit would be a topic of discussion for the meeting. 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 is difficult to understand how denying public access to criminal files in perpetuity serves the public interest in solving crimes and bringing perpetrators to justice, wrote Judge Daniel Klau in his decision. By subscribing to this BDG newsletter, you agree to our. Barbara Beach Hamburg, Madison's 48-year-old mother, had been bludgeoned and stabbed to death, her body hidden under a pile of lawn-furniture cushions outside their Connecticut home. But after watching the entire series through again on Monday morning, I realized that's obviously the point one that I had lost sight of while tuning in week-to-week for the last month, eager to see how the case concluded. A hearing was held in February 2020, where Detective Christopher Sudock testified on behalf of the department that the release could jeopardize a prospective law enforcement action, such as a search or arrest warrant, but could not identify any specific actions investigators had planned. In 2022 Otte was awarded "Rookie of the Year," by the New England Newspaper & Press Association. 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. 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. The Madison Police Department is appealing a court ruling upholing an order by the state's Freedom of Information Commission that the department release all records except signed witness statements related to the unsolved murder of Barbara Beach Hamburg. 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. Lauren Kranc is the assistant content strategy editor at Esquire, where she runs the brands social media accounts and covers pop culture and television, with entirely too narrow an expertise on true crime shows, .css-gk9meg{display:block;font-family:Lausanne,Arial,sans-serif;font-weight:normal;margin-bottom:0;margin-top:0;padding-top:0.25rem;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}@media (any-hover: hover){.css-gk9meg:hover{color:link-hover;}}@media(max-width: 48rem){.css-gk9meg{font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.15;margin-bottom:0.25rem;}}@media(min-width: 40.625rem){.css-gk9meg{font-size:1rem;line-height:1.2;margin-bottom:0.625rem;}}@media(min-width: 64rem){.css-gk9meg{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.2;}}@media(min-width: 73.75rem){.css-gk9meg{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.2;}}Celebrities Who Voice Cartoon Characters, 'The Mandalorian' Season 3 is About to Commence, The Underworld Crossover of the Century Is Coming. The commission in August 2020 ordered Madison police to release all records responsive to the request except for signed witness statements. But Murder on Middle Beach is not a normal documentary. Ever since then, Madison has been looking to uncover every clue and secret so as to solve her case. He never forcefully denies killing Barbara in the series. Barbara's husband Jeffrey Hamburg was the suspect in the case, though he was never charged with her murder, he was jailed for monetary frauds. Madison, now 29 years old, talked to Esquire before the finale of Murder on Middle Beach airs on HBO this Sunday. And as the docuseries comes to a close there are a growing number of theories about Barbara Hamburg's death. 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's really interesting. "Barbie, Barb, it's your sister." The call ends after about five minutes. 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. You watched the last time I talked to my dad. I assume he has, but I'm not sure. Hamburg was only 18 years old when his mother's body was found in 2010 outside of her Connecticut home when her sister, Conway Beach, arrived back at the home with . Moreover, allowing the public to access cold case files after an appropriate period of time is far more likely to improve the odds of an arrest and successful prosecution than it is to prejudice that outcome.. In October of 2019, Anike Neimeyer, the producer of Murder on Middle Beach, submitted a FOI request to the Madison Police Department on behalf of herself and Madison Hamburg requesting records of the case. She cites the fact that the teenager had a rocky relationship with her mother, which was only intensified by Ali's struggles with borderline personality disorder. Through interviews with and secret recordings of his immediate family and the police, Madison and his crew tell the story of Barbara Beach Hamburg's full life and tragic death. An anonymous witness also revealed that she was scared of Conway as she had allegedly threatened her by leaving dead animals on her doorstep, implying that she had the guts and the motive to commit a murder. Do you know if your dad has watched or is watching? The police were called, the crime scene was evaluated, and even some DNA was collected. We work on this case weekly, we have a states attorney assigned to us who works on this weekly. Madison Hamburg looks back after the finale of "Murder on Middle Beach," the docuseries about his search for his mother's killer. Barbara Beach Hamburg, Madison's mother, was killed in 2010 in Madison, Connecticut. "There have been corroborating leads, correcting things, things that we didn't know about," Hamburg told Esquire. When she's not reporting, you can find her hiking Shoreline trails and eating her way through New Haven. According to the HBO docuseries, Beach Hamburg's body was covered with outdoor furniture cushions when it was found. Madisons mother, Barbara Beach Hamburg, before her 2010 murder. Schulz said that the plaintiffs would be thrilled if the police were able to solve the crime, but he said that this wasnt a reason to keep a case open forever. As made evident in the series, Conway Beach is just one of the few family members who hasnt been able to move on from Barbaras murder no matter how much time has passed by. There are no corroborating witnesses for this alibi, according to the doc. By subscribing to this BDG newsletter, you agree to our. The 48-year-old mother of two lived on Middle Beach Road in Madison, Connecticut. The series depicted how the investigation process caused rifts between the family and the secrets which suggested their involvement in the murder. My sister and my aunt are the closest thing I have to my mom, like they're the closest in DNA, and what they sound like. The last time I talked to my dad was on camera. Here are the facts: on March 3rd, 2010, Barbara Beach Hamburg was beaten to death in front of her modest house in Madison, Connecticut. I have to do my best to preserve what I have in that investigation so that I can charge the person or persons with the murder, said Drumm. As we see in the documentary, some even suggest that Conway was envious of Barbara because of the money, success, and love the latter was able to attain. I was most worried about Conway throughout this whole process and I think she's in a good spot. What if theres concerns about corruption or incompetence and now its five years, now its 10 years a reporter wants to know or a family member wants to know. Director Madison Hamburg's relentless pursuit of the truth throughout his quest to find his mother's killer turned over a lot of stones, and even though the TV series has concluded, Madison's work continues off-camera. To this day, the case that shocked a wealthy, idyllic seaside town has remained unsolved. Jeffreyrefuses to discuss the case or his marriage with Madison, except to point to Barbara's alcoholism and, prior to recovery, her pattern of black-out drinking as evidence that Barbara wasn't necessarily to be trusted a line he holds even once Madison finds boxes of documents in the final episodes that could potentially implicate him in unethical (and potentially illegal) business practices that made Barbara feel unsafe. All rights reserved. I know the case is still open. 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. Drumm told CT Examiner that the Police Department had gone through all the files relevant to the case. The Madison Department of Police filed an appeal on September 2. While waiting for the person to arrive, she grabs a drink at the lobby bar. The episodes also addressed skepticism about the police departments initial investigations and even included surreptitious recordings of Madison Hamburgs discussions with detectives at the department. But they're in a really good spot now. Directed by Barbara's son, Madison Hamburg, the docuseries is a chronicle of Madison's return to his home as he is determined to understand . Powered by WordPress.com VIP. It is more than a reasonable possibility, pun intended, that the Connecticut Appellate or Supreme Court will review this decision. We filmed a lot and the story just kept going and going, and my professor realized we weren't gonna finish this project. 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