ABC News is going after true-crime superfans with the launch of the “20/20 True Crime+” subscription tier on Apple Podcasts.
The five-part series chronicles the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson and the search for and eventual arrest of his alleged assassin, Luigi Mangione. The series will delve into Mangione’s background, “tracing his path from a privileged Baltimore upbringing to the center of one of America’s most shocking crimes, for which he has entered a not guilty plea,” according to ABC News’ description. The podcast “examines what may have driven him to murder as this case became a lightning rod in the larger debate around healthcare in the United States.” The series is hosted by ABC News legal analyst Brian Buckmire, who previously hosted award-winning podcast “Bad Rap: The Case Against Diddy.”
Katie den Daas, SVP of global newsgathering at ABC News, said the new subscription tier on Apple Podcasts for “20/20” shows is aimed at super-serving fans of the genre. “We think what sets us apart is that we are still using our fact-based, true-crime journalism to tell these stories,” she said.
The “20/20 True Crime+” subscription is launching first on Apple Podcasts because “Apple is just ubiquitous,” den Daas said. “We want to make it as easy as possible to access our content.”
Janice Johnston, executive producer of “20/20,” said the podcast subscription offering provides an outlet for the program to give audiences additional exclusive content from cases that have been featured on TV, like the McStay family murders, in addition to podcast-only episodes.
“We shoot so much — we do so many interviews, and there are so many gems we leave behind that we are unable to include,” Johnston said. For its extended podcast series on cases of particular interest, “we take what we were unable to share on broadcast and have time to play that extra interview… There are stories where you have a fantastic interview — where someone is really just telling their story and what might have been the toughest day of their life.”