Burden Of Guilt, directed by Patrick Stegall, is a three-part docuseries that centers around the efforts of Tracyraquel Berns to find out the truth about how her younger brother, Matthew Golder died. In December 1971, when Matthew was four months old and Tracy was just short of her second birthday, Matthew died of extreme head injuries. After decades of her family not talking about what happened to Matthew, Tracy found out what was reported: That she picked her little brother up and dropped him out of his crib and onto the floor of his room.
BURDEN OF GUILT: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?
Opening Shot: A woman walking through some tall, golden grass. “I’m going to tell you a story,” she says. “It’s about an unspeakable crime.”
The Gist: An interview with Tracyraquel Berns is the centerpiece of the Burden Of Guilt, but it’s supplemented by interviews with neighbors and friends from her time growing up in suburban Atlanta in the 1970s and ’80s, as well as the DeKalb County law enforcement and prosecuting teams that helped her in the late ’90s and early ’00s with getting to the truth about what happened to Matthew. There were so many questions about the story that had pervaded for a quarter-century that officials even exhumed Matthew’s body in order to give it the autopsy he never got in 1971.
During most of the first episode, Tracy recounts the vivid snapshot memories she has of that time, starting with the day Matthew died. From there, her parents, Kathie Almon and Jan Sandlin, spent much of her younger years fighting and getting back together. At a young age, Tracy ended up being in charge of the house, including the care of another brother who was born a few years after Matthew died. She eventually moved out when she was a teenager and joined the military; she minimized contact with Kathie and Jan ended up in prison.
It was when Tracy was an adult in the 1990s that she finally got coroner’s reports and hospital records that discuss her involvement. Of course, seeing that was a shock. But the injuries that Matthew suffered never made sense if she was the one who tossed him out of his crib, given how little she was at the time.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Burden Of Guilt is based on a podcast of the same name. We kept thinking of the 2003 film Capturing The Friedmans as we watched the first episode.
Our Take: What struck us as we watched Burden Of Guilt was literally the presence of Tracyraquel Berns sitting in front of a camera and telling her story, mostly in a calm, matter-of-fact way. Sure, she’s had a lot of practice at it, having likely gone through therapy and also getting the chance to dissect the events of Matthew’s death both during the trial and the podcast. But this sight of this accomplished woman, a mother and grandmother, recounting that she paid the family’s bills when she was five and other horrific aspects of her childhood, is a testament to how someone can break family cycles of abuse and neglect.
Even though much of the first episode consists of Tracy and her friends and neighbors laying out just how troubled and sad her childhood was, the undercurrent of all of the sadness was Matthew’s death. It could be because of her particular kind of memory, or it’s because of this traumatic event, but Tracy’s snapshots of her early years seem to be remarkably clear, given how young she was as she described some of the memories she had as a toddler and preschooler. It’s a stark picture of a family that was already splintering prior to the baby’s death, but went completely down the drain afterwards.
It’s been thirty years since Tracy found out what had been reported about Matthew’s death, so maybe her reaction in the interview has been tempered by time, but it seems like she didn’t let shock and anger get in the way of logic. When she saw her young daughter drag a gallon jug of milk, she knew that the story that her parents had concocted — and apparently, the coroner at the time bought into — was completely untrue. We’re definitely interested in seeing the process of getting Matthew’s body exhumed and the answers it yielded.
Sex and Skin: None.
Parting Shot: A shot of Matthew’s headstone is seen after Jeff Brickman, DeKalb County ADA, recalls how they came to the decision to exhume Matt’s body.
Sleeper Star: No one stands out more than the composed, calm Tracyraquel Berns.
Most Pilot-y Line: A fair number of the pictures of both Kathie and Jan have the words “Graphic Rendering” in the corner. Does that mean that there were so few existing pictures of both that the producers needed to generate photos via AI or some other way? We’re just really curious about that.
Our Call: STREAM IT. Burden Of Guilt is a gripping docuseries, mostly due to Tracyraquel Berns’ recounting of her childhood and her brother’s death, and her rock-solid determination to make sure the truth of his death was revealed.
Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.
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