- Thank you for the wonderful work on the film.

I taught Eliza and her sister, Sonora.

I taught Forrest and I taught Chandra, who's a witness at the trial.

What was your biggest surprise during the project?

- The biggest surprise during the project?

I mean, honestly, there were so many.

I mean, the biggest surprise is that Dan figured it out.

And he figured it out while the families were still, except for Maurice, and I shouldn't... families is the wrong word for Maurice, but the cloud of people deeply impacted by this were still alive.

Also, it was really interesting to talk to Forrest.

I thought his interview was incredible.

So I wouldn't say it was a surprise- - For the last episode.

- For the last episode, yes.

- [Evan] Right.

- And I don't know, just getting to see how different people process grief differently.

Everyone processes grief differently, and that was really interesting.

- The reluctance on the part of the three who lived to participate in this is interesting to me.

I mean, not surprising.

- Well, I didn't have hardly any time to make it.

- Right.

- And I think, we had to make it really quickly.

And HBO at first thought it was just a coda and then I was like, "Y'all, I don't think it's a coda, this is like long."

And then the more... You know, but I had a deadline that was really... 'Cause they thought it was gonna be quite short.

- Yeah.

- And we were locked into that.

So, yeah, so I think that like if I'd had more time, I think it might've been different.

- Forrest is still living here?

- Yeah.

He has a bar- - Has a bar- - (indistinct) Bar, yeah.

- Right, yeah.

Have you talked to him since?

- Yes.

- How's he doing?

- I think it hasn't really hit him yet.

I just think he's still like worried about like who's gonna cover his shifts when he gets sick or something.

I mean, that's what we talked about.

- He was just thinking about normal stuff.

- Yes.

- Yeah.

Yes?

- So everyone seems to feel that Robert Brashers acted alone, but at the time of the murders, several witnesses said they saw two men sitting in the back of the yogurt shop, nursing their drinks, whispering to each other.

Is there any possibility that this time out he might've had an accomplice, and are they still holding onto the evidence in the possibility that they might identify other DNA at some future point?

- I mean, you should actually talk to Dan later, (audience laughs) but I would say that I'm pretty sure he did it by himself.

And I think that he, if you've seen the fifth episode, he had done this to four other people, the same thing, except he let them live.

And I think for me, in my mind, like the fact that he had a ruse where he could do that and we know that he did that, is pretty convincing to me.

He always worked alone, - that we know of.

But I think this is something that's actively being investigated right now, but I don't think anyone really believes that.

And also that account under hypnosis and it changed a few times.

So I think these things are clouded.

- [Evan] The account referred to here?

- That she's referring to, yes.

- Yeah, and the guys... The person who ultimately it was decided, committed this crime, he died in 1999.

- Yes.

- Right, so there's no way to actually know from him directly.

Sir.

- Great show, Evan.

Margaret, looking back on this, what advice or what lessons do you think the Austin media should take from what you learned, looking back on what happened?

- The Austin media, can you say why the Austin media?

- The news media.

- But what about- - [Audience member] The way the story was covered.

- Oh, yeah - Over the years, are there takeaways that you have that you would suggest to the media?

And then the second part of that is the same thing with all respect to Dan and the people at APD, are there any lessons or observations you have about this over the 30+ years that would be important for APD?

- From law enforcement.

- Oh, sure.

I would answer the second one first, 'cause I feel like the media question is like media... This was such a covered story.

I don't think that I could speak as the media as a blanket because it was covered many different ways, and many different places.

But I will say that the APD, I don't, you know, I don't think you should convict someone based on a confession when we see... We know that cops can lie to you and also, you know, you see coerced confessions in the footage.

But I think that's changed now at APD, so that's what is said in the film at the press conference.

- I've mentioned to you before we came out today that I thought one of the interesting about the film is you're not judgy about anybody or anything, but you're particularly are not judgy about law enforcement or the failings of law enforcement over these 30, 35 years.

- I mean, I think I'm judgy about tunnel vision.

But I also think that when you interview someone, you have to listen to them as a full human.

- Yeah.

- And when I interview people, I don't go in with... Judgy is not something I come in with, like it's just not who I am.

- Right, I mean, people watching the film may judge- - Yeah, let the audience judge, but that's not my job.

- But not your job as a filmmaker.

Commissioner.

- Thank you for doing this, and especially episode five.

Full disclosure, I was in the news media during yogurt and it had an impact on all of us, as well, and thank you for giving us closure in terms of that story being told.

My question is, in the editing process, how did you decide, especially in episode five, when it's like, okay, this is coming to a wrap.

What made it into episode five, and what might still be out there in terms of there any interesting stories or any interesting interviews that didn't make the cut?

- [Margaret] I mean, there's always so many of those.

- Could you share- - Yeah.

- Some of that, please?

- Sure.

Well, you know, it's funny, like with episode five, what was so crazy about episode five, was that sort of the way that we engineered it going in, or what I thought... So usually when you're editing a show like this, and this is the first series I've ever made, but what I learned from these three and a half, four years was that, you know, you usually... You start with something, it goes somewhere else.

With the fifth episode, it did not.

But we didn't have any time to go anywhere else either.

If it hadn't have gone exactly like the way we envisioned it, we wouldn't have finished on time.

We wouldn't have delivered to HBO when we had to.

So it was that tight.

But in my mind, it was about three things.

It was about how Dan solved the crime and the kind of intricacies of that, which is sort of like the first 30 minutes of the episode.

The second part is about how the families responded to having something go... And not just the families like Claire Huey, who's the filmmaker, who's in all first four episodes.

How people, you know, the other previous investigators, how you go from not knowing to knowing what that does to your brain that was so interesting.

'Cause I remember when I interviewed... All of the family members didn't really have room in their brains.

What Sean Ayers says is, "I haven't gotten to that yet," and that always really stuck with me that he didn't feel like he had... There was so much trauma for him that there wasn't room yet for the boys.

And I thought, like people have been kind of judgy about that, who watch it, but I- - Why doesn't the family... Why don't the families have more empathy for the- - I think because he doesn't have space for it yet.

- Right.

- Like, I think that... And I think the judginess is misplaced because we haven't gone through that, you know?

And I think that, you know, I think they will get to it, and I think he's very smart to say "yet" when he says that.

And then the third part of the episode is about what happens to the boys who are wrong.

I shouldn't call them boys, they're men, who are wrongfully accused.

And 'cause that was... You know, when I heard that Robert Brashers was found, that was the first thought I had, was about, what about them?

I mean, they've had this cloud over them forever, like I really want to talk to them.

But usually with something like that, with the trauma they've endured, they're not gonna wanna talk to me right away.

Like I didn't... In the first four episodes, I didn't like say, "Oh, you definitely didn't do it," 'cause I didn't know.

So they're not gonna want... They're gonna think, you know, they're not gonna want to talk to me necessarily.

Even though I thought they probably didn't do it, I didn't say definitively in my first four episodes if they didn't.

So I think that there was a barrier to entry there that, you know, I couldn't just (snaps) get in.

- There was the relationship between Pierce and Wellborn.

(Margaret hums) - Yeah.

- And then in the fifth episode, Pierce's widow- - Right.

- And Wellborn, kind of once all of this had been resolved.

I thought it was very emotional.

- I remember Justin, the sound man, when he was... He got that moment on his boom.

And I remember, 'cause we were at that conference and that was the last day we shot, and he was like, "We got it, we got it."

'Cause he could hear it and I was like, "What did they say?

I couldn't hear it."

And he told me and I was like, "Oh, my God."

- Yeah, because it was Pierce after all, all those years before who had ultimately set all this in motion.

- Yes.

- And the question was years later, did Wellborn or any of these folks essentially forgive Pierce?

(Margaret hums) I mean, really, it's hard.

It's hard to watch.

- That moment was crazy.

- It was extraordinarily hard to watch, yeah.

Speaking of wraps, that's a wrap.

Please give Margaret Brown a big hand.

- Thank y'all.

- Thank her for being here.

We'll see you all real soon, thank you.

(audience claps)