HBO's 'A Killer Story' Revisits Dana Chandler Cold Case — SkimNews
Get the Culture newsletter
Daily culture — film, music, books, the trends and ideas worth your attention. Free.
- HBO's "A Killer Story" follows journalist Joe Sexton and director Matthew Galkin over six years of filming as they investigate the 2002 double murder of Karen Harkness and Mike Sisco in Topeka, Kansas, with Part Two premiering Sept. 17 and the series finale on Sept. 24
- Dana Chandler, Sisco's ex-wife, was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder in 2012 based on the contentious nature of their 1998 divorce, despite no physical evidence linking her to the crime scene
- The Kansas Supreme Court overturned Chandler's conviction in 2018 after determining prosecutor Jacqie Spradling had lied about a protection-from-abuse order that never existed; Spradling was disbarred in 2022 for a "serious pattern of grossly unethical misconduct"
- Keen and Eileen Umbehr, amateur investigators who initially set out to expose Harkness' son-in-law and former county attorney Jeff Sutton, spent years and sold family land to fund their work proving Chandler's innocence—after Sexton ignored her initial tip, Eileen sent up to 25 emails in a single 24-hour period
- A 2009 visit by CBS's 48 Hours to Topeka sparked renewed public interest that led authorities to arrest Chandler, though no new evidence had emerged since the case went cold
- Producer Josh Levine described the docuseries as "a story about a story," with Galkin noting the project grapples with confirmation bias across every faction—prosecutors, locals, and the Umbehrs—who hold competing theories of the case
Why it matters: For viewers and journalism-watchers, the series tests whether entertainment-driven true-crime coverage can distort actual courtrooms: Chandler's arrest followed a 2009 48 Hours segment with no new physical evidence, and her 2012 conviction hinged on a nonexistent protection-from-abuse order. The Kansas Supreme Court reversed the conviction in 2018, and the prosecutor was disbarred in 2022, leaving the documentary to tell a story without a smoking gun.
Ask SkimNews
