The Killing of Dominique Dunne by John Thomas Sweeney & NON-Creep Theresa Saldana "Victims for Victims"
What a Creep
Sonia Mansfield
4.5 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 21 June 2024
⏱️ 71 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Season 25, Episode 7
The Murder of Dominique Dunne by John Thomas Sweeney
Dominique Dunne, known for her role in the 1982 film "Poltergeist," had a bright future. Tragically, her life was cut short on October 30, 1982, when her ex-boyfriend strangled her, John Thomas Sweeney, outside her West Hollywood home. She never regained consciousness and died on November 4, 1982, at just 22 years old.
The trial that followed sparked outrage. Sweeney was convicted of voluntary manslaughter, not murder, and served only three years of a six-and-a-half-year sentence. This lenient sentence highlighted severe flaws in the justice system's handling of domestic violence cases. Dominique's death brought attention to domestic abuse, prompting her family, especially her father, Dominick Dunne, to advocate for victims' rights and legal reforms. Her legacy endures through these efforts and her memorable work in film.
Trigger warning: Domestic/Partner Violence
Sources:
- Vanity Fair
- Vanity Fair May 2008
- Vanity Fair March 1984
- Los Angeles Times December 3, 1986
- E True Hollywood Story
- All That is Interesting
- City Journal
- Variety
- Vulture
- The Friday Afternoon Cub: A Family Memoir by Griffin Dunne
- The Murder of Dominique Dunne by Erica Thomas and Troy McElfresh
- Dominique Dunne Wikipedia
- People Magazine October 10, 1983
- Slate
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to What a Creep. The show with Margotaniu and Sonia Mansfield talking about |
| 0:06.0 | creeps from the past to the present. |
| 0:08.8 | This is your quick guide to the biggest Creeps, jerks, ass, and losers, the best of the worst. |
| 0:15.0 | From two nice ladies who want the world to be a creep this is Margot Donnie you and my cohort and |
| 0:30.2 | creep attitude as always is the amazing Sonia Mansfield. |
| 0:33.0 | Hey Sonia. |
| 0:34.5 | Hello my friend. |
| 0:35.6 | Hello my friend. |
| 0:36.8 | We are the podcast that talks about creeps from the past to the present. |
| 0:40.6 | We have an, I guess we would say old time because it was from 40 years ago a Hollywood murder and it was murder by the way just yes |
| 0:49.7 | But the story is gonna take you to some places. |
| 0:53.4 | If this is your first time listening, |
| 0:54.8 | we also want you to know that we end every episode |
| 0:57.4 | with someone who is not a creep, |
| 0:59.1 | so it leaves you feeling a little bit more uplifted |
| 1:01.8 | about the world. We are always looking for |
| 1:05.1 | suggestions for creeps and also the non creeps. So I say start with the |
| 1:08.8 | social media stuff. We do have a basic Facebook page. We don't use it. It's a place where people go to |
| 1:14.7 | complain about our language or to ask us about episodes on our Patreon wall. |
| 1:18.8 | We'll get to that in a second. But we do use salty language so if you're listening in the car with |
| 1:26.8 | your kids maybe it's not the great types. Yeah or or maybe you don't care if your |
| 1:31.7 | kids hear the word shit fucking damn. |
... |
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