In the film, Baker’s attorney, Scott Miller, said Eunice did not know her own limitations and would have confessed to killing John F. Kennedy if it meant she could go home. Brown said she could understand why law enforcement and court officials might have thought her daughter was lying or hiding the truth, and likened Eunice’s mental abilities to that of a basic computer. “You can put the information in and she will spit it out,” she said.

Baker’s gripping 15-day trial received extensive newspaper and TV coverage. Grunberg said he had seen some of the news stories, but after speaking to Baker in person prior to the trial, he said he knew she was disabled. “I’m talking to someone whose brain works different than mine,” he said, calling the idea of her pre-meditating a crime “nonsense.”

The New York State Supreme Court, Appellate Division, Third Judicial Department disagreed with the Tioga County jury’s decision to convict Baker of second-degree murder. The appellate court reduced the charge to criminally negligent homicide, which has a maximum term of 1 1/3 to four years. Since Baker had already spent four years in prison, she was released.

According to the appellate court’s decision, Baker’s mental disabilities — which include her IQ of 73 — brought into doubt her ability to understand the risk the over-heated apartment presented. In the film, Tioga County District Attorney Gerald Keene, who prosecuted the case, said Baker’s mental disability was relevant, but did not excuse her conduct.

Brown said Wednesday she doesn’t blame the investigator who questioned her daughter for 4 1/2 hours. “For him to do his job the right way, he would persistently interrogate the individual,” she said. The problem arose when “he failed to see that he was dealing with a person with disabilities,” Brown said. Baker doesn’t comprehend what she is saying, nor will she show a lot of emotion unless overwhelmed, Brown said.

In the film, Beverly Davenport, Baker’s former special education teacher, said while the now 29-year-old might dress and talk like everyone else, she is not. Davenport said Baker perceives people in authority as infallible. Also in the film are Baker’s former principal and a corrections officer who regularly interacted with Eunice. Brown said that advocating for people with disabilities is of paramount importance to her and her family, and she hopes Borderline will aid in the fight. She said one step in the right direction would be to have all confessions recorded on video or audio tape.

Grunberg said 4 percent of the nation’s nearly 2 million prison inmates are mentally disabled and said he has spoken with families who are in the same situation Baker and her family faced. “I was so happy that there was such a positive ending to this story,” Grunberg said. “If there hadn’t been a camera following this poor girl for five years, who knows what would have happened.”

AUDIENCE REACTIONS

From the viewers of the Picture This… Film Festival …it gets you going around the issues…

…excellent cohesion…

…did what a documentary film should do – tell a story about a slice of life…

…traces the history/trajectory of this tragedy…

…heart-rending…

…good job of sketching Eunice’s background – her family, the emotions…

…great drawn out final conclusion…

…demonstrates the powerlessness of the marginalized in dealing with the judicial system…

no wonder so many disabled people are in jail…!

…excellent filming… …was instantly pulled in by this woman’s story…her mom worked so hard to free her daughter…

…such an interesting story, it’s not just about disability, it’s about poverty, education, the unity of family…

…inspiring to see a woman strong and holding her head up with dignity…kept me intrigued and interested…

…sequence of events and background contextual information is well laid out…

…use of spokespeople from varying perspectives works well to keep audience connected and interested…

…approach is very creative and effectively portrays the many contradictions and misperceptions in this case…

…commentary about Eunice’s vulnerability, judgments made in the media and her mom’s lifelong efforts to avoid labeling Eunice are very compelling…

…this is a winner…!

…powerful doc about a miscarriage of justice…

…peels back the layers regarding justice for the poor and the disabled…

From the televison and DVD viewers

Dear Slawomir,
I am the Librarian … I recently obtained a copy of your film “Borderline: The people vs. Eunice Baker,” and also took it home and watched it. I want to congratulate you on making an extremely powerful and haunting film with many important messages about such issues as the criminal justice system, family strength, & mental retardation, and even about more tangential issues such as obesity. It was obviously quite a labor of persistence for you to stick with this story and family over many years, not knowing what direction their lives were going to take. I found myself thinking a lot about the film over the next couple of days, wondering how the family members are doing, and especially impressed by their supportiveness of one another during extremely trying times which might have torn other families apart. There was the possibility for redemption at the end of the film, for sure, if the key players had not been too damaged over the years to reclaim their lives. thanks again for making such a potent documentary. I hope that it will be seen by a great many people.

Best, Leigh

This episode just aired on our local PBS station. I was truly moved by this. I have a nephew that is mentally retarded and a niece that is ‘borderline’ retarded. I also have a three year old granddaughter. So, needless to say, I saw this from all view points. There is something that really disturbs me about the whole thing…Why were the parents of the little three year old blameless? As parents, it was their responsibility to provide adequate care for their child, anythingless was negligence. Surely, they knew that Eunice had a diminished mental awareness and therefore should be held accountable as well. I feel the parents were more at fault than Eunice was. But, my opinion and the law aren’t always the same. It was a very well told story and photographed well. I believe it deserves to be shown at a more viewable time. I think it came on at 4:00A.M. this morning, (I only seen it because I don’t sleep much since my son was killed in Iraq). The general public needs to know about things like this. It’s something most of us have never given any thought to and unless you’re in a situation such as this, we wouldn’t think about it. Thank you for telling this story and for doing it with dignity.
Sincerely, Ann

Dear Sir,
Your excellent doc Borderline was aired on Maryland Public Television an hour ago. It was extremely moving. I’m interested in Rachel’s interests towards college and law school. It would appear that some civil penalties would be due the family for enduring the flawed verdict. They certainly live in squalor, and if Rachel is as bright as she is motivated, she’ll need financial help towards her scholastic goals. I’m a former pediatrician and now pediatric subspecialist, and am angry at how this tradgedy was perpetrated on Eunice. Though it aired on PBS, you should find interest in others with a wider spectrum of viewers as well. I’d even think HBO.
Duane, MD

Dear Mr. Grunberg,
I just wanted to send an email to convey my appreciation for the subject you present in your film “Borderline”. I’ve just finished watching it on Link TV and was a blubbering fool throughout much of it. I am still shaken up and tearful as I write this. I am the mother of an eighteen year old son who also has mental retardation and has had a few behavioral issues that especially frighten me as turns into an adult. I can put myself in the place of Eunice’s mother easily and it terrifies me to think about my son being incarcerated for even a night. I cannot begin to imagine five years. It physically hurts me to think about it. Thank you so much for bringing this subject to film and to the public.
Very sincerely, Shellie