"The Soering System" in English!

Episode One is out now. Plus, where is Söring? And "Killing for Love"?

First, the good news. The German-language podcast “Das System Söring”, which has now been downloaded well over 1 million times, has just been released in English. The first episode is out now, the rest will come weekly:

You’ll hear me, Terry Wright, Annabel and others discussing the case from an informed critical perspective. I hope you enjoy it. If you have any questions, feel free to post them here.

On another note, the Netflix documentary is still on-track for release this fall. Other documentaries will be released at around the same time. Daniela Hillers, the Hamburg ghostwriter who is writing a book about the case, has announced it in a series of oddly rambling German-language press releases. In other documentary news, the 2016 film Das Versprechen / Killing for Love does not appear to be available for streaming anywhere at this point. Perhaps this is just a matter of rights contracts expiring. However, you would think that with the release of the Netflix series just months away, Vetter and Steinberger would want to profit from renewed interest in the case.

Another possibility is they are quietly distancing themselves from the movie because it is about to come in for another round of intense critical scrutiny. It’s no longer a blog by an anonymous English solicitor or a newspaper article by some American lawyer criticizing the movie. The new documentaries will introduce the movie’s weaknesses to a worldwide audience. I have been especially critical of Killing for Love’s treatment of Jim Farmer, the college buddy of Elizabeth’s whom the movie smears in an attempt to locate an alternate suspect for the Haysom murders.

I just watched the BBC Storyville version of the movie again and noted that the movie — working as always by means of plausibly deniable insinuation — outs Farmer as gay, reveals he has a criminal record, suggests he was a drug dealer and extortionist, and even hints he may have had something to do with the murders of the Haysoms. And all of this came out after his death in 2014. The movie even shows his online death announcement with his full legal name, and a handwritten note with his date of birth. I have always regarded the movie’s character assassination against a dead man to have been its low point, and I have made this point to numerous interview teams. Perhaps Vetter and Steinberger have suffered some pangs of conscience.

At any rate, neither of them has ever publicly defended their movie against the criticisms I and others have leveled against it. I take this as a concession that my criticisms were on-point, although I wish Vetter or Steinberger had the courage to admit their errors and make amends to Jim Farmer’s family.

Meanwhile, Söring has again gone dark on social media; I haven’t seen any new posts on TikTok, Facebook, or Twitter (which he’s never used much) since early July. Söring has gone dark on social media for weeks or even months several times since 2020, always without explanation. He then returns after a while, explaining that he was working on a project or just needed a mental health break. This time, however, feels different. My guess is that Söring has just decided he’s not really meant for social media. His videos and reels seemed a bit forced and try-hard. The comments were hardly inspiring; clueless newbies asking awkward questions such as how it felt to be reunited with his family or whether he wants to get back together with Elizabeth, religious obsessives urging him to come to the Lord, and middle-aged ladies posting lots of heart emojis.

Further, he is unwilling to share anything about his private life, which is the kiss of death. Social media audiences like to get at least a general idea of who you are and how you live. It’s possible to do this while also maintaining reasonable privacy. Yet aside from a few posts about learning to drive or receiving some family mementos, Söring has kept mum. This means the only thing he can post about is life in prison and his case, and everyone who is interested already knows about these things. Söring simply has nothing new to say, which is fatal to any social media presence.

Yet this would seem to be an awkward time to go dark on social media. Söring knows the Netflix documentary is approaching. If he wanted to ride its coattails to greater prominence, he should be doing what I’m doing, which is keeping fairly active on social media and touting my role in the documentary. Söring may be apprehensive about the series. The filmmakers have promised to strive for balance, and I think they will. That means, inevitably, that the series will report facts which reflect poorly on Söring and undermine his innocence narrative. Indeed, the documentary could spell the death blow for Söring’s innocence claims, especially if Söring’s proxies, such as Christian Wulff, John Grisham, Martin Sheen, and Jason Flom refuse to speak on his behalf. And double especially if any of them have the courage Annabel did to admit their were taken in by a plausible con-man. I doubt it.

Perhaps Söring actually has decided to retire from public life. The brief spate of interviews timed to accompany Burkhard Benecken’s book is past, and nobody seems to be much interested in Söring’s story. The test will be what happens after the documentaries come out. Unlike prior documentaries on his case, these will raise questions Söring has no good answers to. Perhaps Söring will rise to the challenge anyway. However, I think there’s a good chance he will refuse interview requests, citing his privacy. At that point, his “campaign for justice” to have his innocence recognized will effectively be over.

We’ll see. If Söring does decide to retire to private life, good for him. He will never admit killing the Haysoms — that is a psychological impossibility — but at least he will stop spreading misinformation about the case and harming other peoples’ reputations. He currently lives in a small town in northern Germany; perhaps his neighbors don’t even know who he is.

In any event, I am still working feverishly on by book about the case, which will come out in German and English in late October. It will deliver a thorough account of the case and of Söring’s media campaign. I will post updates as regularly as possible, so stay tuned!