The behind-the-scenes stories of the iconic movie The Exorcist still shock the general public, even 50 years after its release. What not everyone knows is that there is a convicted murderer among the actors in the movie.
We’re talking about the murder case involving Paul Bateson, which was portrayed by Netflix in an episode of the series Mindhunter in 2019. Find out more about the details of this shocking event!
The Exorcist was Paul Bateson’s movie debut
It all started when William Friedkin, director of The Exorcist, was impressed by the medical team at New York University Hospital during his research to recreate a specific scene in his new horror film.
That’s how the filmmaker offered Paul Bateson, a radiology technician, the opportunity to act in a scene in which Regan would undergo a disturbing cerebral angiography. Four years after the film’s release, the next news story involving Paul’s name took everyone by surprise.
Paul Bateson was convicted of murdering a journalist
In the late 1970s, The Village Voice journalist Arthur Bell published an article criticizing police neglect of the murders of gay men in the Greenwich Village area. What he didn’t expect was that his criticism would result in an anonymous phone call related to the murder of Verrill, a Variety reporter stabbed to death in his own apartment in 1979.
In the phone call, the person confessed to being Verrill’s murderer and gave Bell details of the fateful night. In another call, a name was mentioned as the alleged killer: Paul Bateson.
When arrested, the former radiology technician was unemployed due to alcohol problems and using the victim’s credit card. Bateson claimed to be innocent and that his statements in the phone calls were made under the influence of alcohol and inspired by an article by Bell about the case.
The seriousness of the situation didn’t stop there! During the trial, he was also accused of killing several other men whose remains were found in the Hudson River between 1975 and 1977. The prosecution claimed that he had confessed these murders to a friend, citing the precision of the cuts on the bodies as evidence of Bateson’s medical knowledge.
However, the lack of solid evidence and the different modus operandi led the judge to reject the charges of the six additional murders and sentenced him to at least 20 years in prison for Verrill’s death. Bateson was only released in 2003 and since then there has been no news of his whereabouts.
At the time of his conviction, the news shocked Bateson’s former work colleagues, who considered him to be a good-natured and professional person. This bizarre story inspired the director of The Exorcist to produce the controversial crime thriller Night Partners (1980) with Al Pacino.