Netflix’s latest true crime docuseries pays tribute to a special ‘powerhouse’ figure
Linda Deutsch was a ‘powerhouse’ figure in journalism(Image: Netflix)
Netflix’s latest true crime documentary includes a special tribute one of the high profile figures taking part.
The platform has released the latest instalment in the Conversations with a Killer series.
Previous entries have included closer looks at high profile criminals including Jeffrey Dahmer, John Wayne Gacy and Ted Bundy. Now, the most recent edition focuses on Charles Manson.
According to its synopsis, the three-part title draws on previously unreleased prison recordings, firsthand accounts, and archival footage, to trace Charles Manson’s rise as a cult leader, the 1969 murders that followed, and the media spectacle of his trial.
It features interviews with former Manson Family members and law enforcement alongside recorded phone calls with Manson himself. Also featuring is one of the extinguished journalists who covered the story at the time.
In the final moments of the last episode of the series, a special tribute is made for this person. A title card appears that reads: “In loving memory of Linda Deutsch.”
It appears after the production reveals what happened to other individuals who spent time behind bars for the ‘Manson murders’. But who was Linda Deutsch? Here’s all you need to know.
Who was Linda Deutsch?
Linda Deutsch was a journalist from New Jersey, who worked for Associated Press as a court reporter in Los Angeles. She was a well known figure in the industry and enjoyed an illustrious career.
While studying for a degree in English in 1965, she worked on the student newspaper The Outlook. There she held prominent roles as Features Editor, while also running the letters section.
Her very first professional front page byline, while working as an intern for her local paper was her coverage of the civil rights march where Martin Luther King Jr made the “I have a dream” speech.
When she joined the Associated Press in 1967, she was the only woman working out of the Los Angeles office. She would go on to report on high profile cases including Charles Manson, O.J. Simpson, Erik and Lyle Menendez, Phil Spector and Michael Jackson to name a few.
She also wrote a book concentrating on the Simpson case, called Verdict: The Chronicle of the O. J. Simpson Trial. While as demonstrated by the new Netflix series, was a regular talking head discussing Charles Manson’s trial.
In a tribute to her from her old college paper, The Outlook said she was “a powerhouse in the journalism industry and a positive figure for female journalists everywhere”. Deutsch successfully campaigned for equal pay and the right for female journalists to be referred to as ‘newswomen’ and not ‘newsmen.’
She was named a special correspondent in 1992 and retired in 2014 at the age of 71. Never forgetting her roots, she endowed journalism scholarships at her former school and they named their newsroom after her.
Deutsch did not get married or have children and said of her personal life: “I have a godson who means the world to me. And I have a very full life, but it never included marriage. I think my relationships mostly broke up because of my work.”
She died in 2024 at the age of 80, two years after she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.
Conversations with a killer: The Charles Manson Tapes is streaming on Netflix