Episode
THE TRIAL OF ARTHUR J. SHAWCROSS—Michael Benson
- Published
- Apr 20, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 3651
- Processing state
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- https://www.spreaker.com/show/truemurder
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Summary
In 1990, Monroe County’s daytime television viewing habits were disrupted by a TV first: the live broadcast of The People v. Arthur J. Shawcross. Never before had home viewers anywhere been given access to gavel-to-gavel coverage of a sordid murder trial. The show lasted eleven weeks, September to December. Viewers that normally followed daytime dramas or game shows were instead focused on the trial of a serial-killer who’d confessed to killing ten women in Monroe County, and one more in Wayne County, but whose lawyers claimed he was insane and not responsible for his actions. Fans of courtroom dramas like Perry Mason, now saw the real thing, sometimes lazy in its pacing, but raw and unfiltered in its subjects and language. The show ran on cable station WGRC (Greater Rochester Cable) and was set in teak-paneled Courtroom 206 of the Monroe County Public Safety Building, which had been equipped and wired as a TV studio. A few watched the first day’s broadcast, were repulsed and changed the channel. Most viewers however were fascinated and watched for the rest of the fall. The show’s villain obviously was Shawcross, yet he put no work into his role. . Throughout, he sat at the defense table motionless and silent, staring at his shoes. The hero was Assistant District Attorney Charles Siragusa, who led the prosecution. By the trial’s third week, Siragusa was receiving fan mail and baked cookies from “groupies.” Not every witness fared well under the lights. One defense witness, a forensic psychiatrist on the stand for many days, while trying to convince the jury of Shawcross’s insanity, drew unwanted laughter and was eventually satirized by morning radio shows because of her rambling answers and disorganized demeanor. For several weeks, videotapes were shown in the courtroo…