The story of the "Golden State Killer" isn't quite over. A year after the guilty plea of Joseph James DeAngelo, a special episode of I'll Be Gone in the Dark is coming to HBO and HBO Max at 10 p.m. Eastern and Pacific time on June 21.
The original six-part documentary was based on the bestselling book by the late author Michelle McNamara's investigation into the Golden State Killer. McNamara (who was married to comedian Patton Oswalt at the time), was instrumental in keeping the case alive for years. She died suddenly in 2016, before the arrest of DeAngelo — a former police officer — and his sentence to live in prison for 50 home-invasion rapes and 13 murders in California during the 1970s and '80s.
From the HBO synopsis:
This powerful special closes one chapter in McNamara’s investigative work on cold cases, and brings to light another, highlighting the start of McNamara’s life-long fascination with unsolved murders. The rape and murder of Kathy Lombardo in 1984 in McNamara’s hometown of Oak Park, Illinois and the inability of authorities to solve the case sparked McNamara’s interest in investigating cold cases, ultimately leading her to an obsessive search for the Golden State Killer. McNamara was just 14 years old when Kathy Lombardo was killed not far from where she lived, and this tragic, as yet unsolved crime would change the course of McNamara’s life.
The new special episode "brings shocking new revelations to light in the Lombardo case and features the late McNamara’s own research into the rape and murder, which led to her return to Oak Park in 2013 to investigate it on the ground, quickly finding inconsistencies in the police work." It'll also feature McNamara's research and voice recordings, and interviews with president-day residents of Oak Park.
The new episode is directed by Elizabeth Wolff, who also worked on the original documentary series.
