Zara McDermott: 'New doc is a study on social media – not about the crime'

In 2022, four students at the University of Idaho were stabbed to death at their house, leading to a social media frenzy of amateur sleuths and 'TikTok detectives' attempting to 'solve' the case, despite the police working round the clock to do just that.

The social media attention forced the police to set up a misinformation page on their website, to stop the spread of false narratives – and it is this that McDermott focuses on.

The 60-minute documentary attempts to "uncover the story of the social media frenzy that sprung up following the tragic murders", and sees McDermott fly out to Idaho a little under a year after the tragic event and come face to face with some of the online sleuths and citizen journalists who trying to help – or at least thought they were helping.

"I started watching videos about this case and then my TikTok For You Page [was] all about this case for genuinely months on end," McDermott told RadioTimes.com in an exclusive interview.

"It was building and growing as the case was evolving and more information was coming out and I've just never seen anything like this before. So I thought making a documentary about this would just be really fascinating."

The attention the case gained came in fast, with online sleuths questioning the police, stirring up conspiracy theories and blaming innocent people of crimes they didn't commit – and it wouldn't be the first time something like this has happened.

When British woman Nicola Bulley disappeared in 2023, TikTok was rife with "theories", and a 36-year-old man was arrested after posting videos on the app of the search area.

While most people believe that this kind of sleuthing is far from OK, McDermott believes videos and conspiracies of this kind will continue to happen.

"I think unless social media is heavily regulated in the same way that the mainstream news is, it's never going to be the same," she explained.

"I think it's great that people have the freedom to speak out about what they want on social media, especially with important issues. But when it comes to true crime cases, when it comes to a quadruple homicide [that] police are investigating, I'm not sure how much of a help the social media world was in this case."

Six weeks after the Idaho murders, Bryan Christopher Kohberger was charged with the murders of Madison Mogen, Kaylee Goncalves, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin. He has pleaded not guilty.

Kohberger is still yet to stand trial, which begs the question of whether a documentary like this is the right call in any form.

Viewers may find themselves perplexed at the lack of focus the documentary places on the actual crimes, but that was the point, according to McDermott.

"The documentary is not actually about the case," she told RadioTimes.com. "It's not about the murderer, it's not about the trial. The documentary is essentially using this as a case study and it's really important, I think, to have a case that's ongoing for a documentary like this, because people are still in the thick of it."

McDermott explained that the documentary "exemplifies how social media can be a benefit or a hindrance to a case" and argues that it's "really timely".

She continued: "It's looking at what the future of true crime and what the future of these types of cases look like in the social media space.

"We have to accept that nowadays our young people are turning to social media to get their news. They're not turning to mainstream media anyone ,and if this is going to be the future, then what does it look like?

"I think it's a really important and timely film."

Throughout the documentary, McDermott meets a number of people, including Jonathan Lee Riches, better known as JLR Investigates. Viewers see Jonathan in action at the heart of the case – something which took McDermott by surprise.

"I think seeing someone completely devote their life to true crime in that way was something that I've never seen before," she said. "The commitment to posting that many things a day is just crazy... I think that's up for debate whether he is a real journalist or not, but to him, he's just as much of a journalist."

While the documentary itself isn't at the centre of the murder investigation, as McDermott says, it shines a light on a "timely" issue, we are, no doubt, going to continue to see in future years.

The Idaho Murders: Trial by TikTok does a good job at portraying the extent social media sleuths go to – but isn't that already clear? For McDermott, it's important to show audiences just how much attention true crime is garnering, something she doesn't think is going to change.

She told RadioTimes.com: "I think that this is a really important film to watch because this is the future of how true crime and how murder investigations and anything of that ilk is reported nowadays, on social media.

"We have to start understanding what we're consuming and what impacts that has not only on the families, not only on the victims, not only on the investigation but also, I suppose, on ourselves as well.

"What does that mean for us going forward? Can we all be sucked into this kind of true crime spectacle on social media? And should we be sensationalising and making celebrities of victims and killers as well?"

The Idaho Murders: Trial by TikTok is available to watch on BBC Three and BBC iPlayer now.

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