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Murder Among The Mormons: Fans Reeling At 'Crazy' Plot Twist To Netflix Doc

Murder Among The Mormons: Fans Reeling At 'Crazy' Plot Twist To Netflix Doc

The Netflix documentary follows the story of Mark Hofmann and the Salt Lake City bombings.

Joanna Freedman

Joanna Freedman

Murder Among The Mormons is the latest Netflix documentary to send true crime fanatics into a spin.

Directed by Mormon raised Jared Hess (Napoleon Dynamite) and Tyler Measom (An Honest Liar), the doc centres around three horrific bombings which took place within Utah's Salt Lake City Mormon community in 1985, and the mystery that surrounded them.

The bombings killed two victims, both from the Latter Day Saint (LDS) church, and a third victim was seriously injured but remained alive. As It turns out, this survivor was Mark Hofmann, then 30, who ended up being the constructor of the bombs after all.

But that's not even the best part of it. Then comes a plot twist.

*** Spoilers below ***

It turns out Hofmann was a fraudster, who had started creating bombs after selling a collector the McLellin collection - a group of documents by William E. McLellin, which were seen to contain damaging details about the LDS Church, of which he had broken ties with.

Despite selling the collection, Hofmann didn't know where it was, and didn't have the time to forge it, due to the document's length.

So, he decided to kill collector Steven Christensen with one of his pipe bombs on October 15, 1985 so he didn't get suspicious, and subsequently murder Kathy Sheets, the wife of his first victim's business associate, afterwards, for the same reason.

Hofmann got away with the first two killings initially, and police honed in on the collapse of Sheets' husband's investment business, assuming the bombs were down to "disgruntled investors".

But a day after Sheets' murder, he accidentally threw himself into the firing line, when a bomb he had made exploded prematurely in his car, seriously injuring him in the process.

Hofmann gave the game away when his own car exploded (
Netflix)

The bomb, which went off in Hofmann's blue Toyota, also appeared to have destroyed a huge stock of precious Mormon papers, including the famous White Salamander Letter - the contents of which he had claimed had the potential to risk the future of Mormonism.

But as he lay in hospital, the details of Hofmann's forgery, theft and fraud begun to unravel.

He later confessed to his crimes, pleading guilty to two counts of second-degree murder and two of theft by deception, and was sentenced to a life in prison.

Hofmann remained in a maximum security prison (Utah State Prison in Draper) until December 2015, and he was then moved to Central Utah Correctional Facility in Gunnison, where he still remains.

A teaser for the Netflix show reads: "A series of pipe bombs kills two people and severely injures another, jolting the epicentre of the LDS Church.

Hofmann was sentenced to life in prison (
Utah Department of Corrections)

"The murders send further shockwaves through the community when a trove of early Mormon letters and diaries are found destroyed in the vehicle of the third victim, Mark Hofmann, a renowned collector of rare documents, including the infamous White Salamander Letter - an artefact whose contents threatened to shake the very foundations of Mormonism. As Hofmann fights for his life, investigators race to uncover the truth."

Reacting to the bombshell doc, fans had a lot of feelings as they watched the twists and turns unfold.

"Alright. just started watching Murder Among The Mormons & i'm already mind blown," wrote one fan on Twitter, as they started watching.

Another wrote: "Murder Among The Mormons: wild. Plot twist I didn't really see coming."

The main mystery surrounds the sacred documents (
Netflix)

Meanwhile, a third concurred: "Murder Among The Mormons on Netflix is mad wild I am SCREAMING".

That's quite a review!

You can watch Murder Among The Mormons on Netflix now.

Featured Image Credit: Netflix

Topics: True Crime, TV News, TV Entertainment, Netflix