'The Confession Killer' Trailer: Meet The Man Who Killed At Least 360 People (Or Did He?)

Netflix has become quite a bastion of serial killer documentaries and dramas. They're really hitting that sweet spot of people who are obsessed with the most terrifying people on the planet. But their latest true crime documentary series comes with a surprising lack of truth to the crime.

The Confession Killer is a new five-part documentary series that chronicles the criminal escapades of Henry Lee Lucas, a man who confessed to killing at least 360 people in the 1980s. The only problem is that despite having a confession and a conviction for many of these crimes, for which Lucas remembered astonishing details, he may not have actually been the killer. Watch The Confession Killer trailer below to better understand this perplexing story.

So many families thought law enforcement had found the killer who took loved ones from them. But somehow, this man tricked them into thinking he was a notorious serial killer. However, in the process, he also exposed some of the biggest problems, inconsistencies, and shortcomings of the American justice system.

What I'm most interested in learning is exactly why a man like Henry Lee Lucas would lie about committing crimes so freely. There may not be an answer beyond mental instability. But perhaps the more important question is why were so many people willing to believe him without the proper evidence? Was he that convincing, or was law enforcement just too lazy to care?

The Confession Killer is directed by by Oscar nominee Robert Kenner (Food Inc.) and Taki Oldham (The Billionaires' Tea Party).

During the early '80s, Henry Lee Lucas confessed to hundreds of murders, bringing closure to unsolved cases and grieving families. Even with no direct evidence linking Lucas to the crime scenes, he stunned authorities with his ability to sketch victims' portraits while citing brutal details of each attack. Yet journalists and attorneys found impossibilities in Lucas' timeline, and DNA testing started to contradict his internationally-reported claims. The Confession Killer, a riveting five-part docuseries, explores how the man once called America's most prolific serial killer was really a complex figure entangled with a flawed justice system.

The Confession Killer arrives on Netflix on December 6, 2019.