Show tonight to reexamine and take new look at Lizzie Borden case

While many of us are trying to stay home to avoid spreading or receiving COVID-19, a well known Fall River story will be broadcast today in a new light in hopes of entertaining us.

Erin Moriarty and 48 HOURS investigate a double homicide that captured the nation, and take a fresh look at a very cold case that turns up surprising results in “Lizzie Borden Took an Axe”.

Folks have sung the rhyme “Lizzie Borden took an axe and gave her mother 40 whacks….” But was the rhyme correct? Did Borden kill her father and stepmother in 1892? And what if everything people think they know about the case is completely wrong?

Borden, then 32, was acquitted of using a hatchet to brutally hack to death her father and stepmother. Borden and the housekeeper were the only other people in the locked home at the time, and police quickly seized on Lizzie Borden as the suspect. But what did the jury of 12 men see when the case was presented in court? What evidence existed? Is it possible they couldn’t believe a woman was capable of murder?

“When someone is struck multiple times with a hatchet to the head, that’s personal,” says crime scene expert Erin Rubas.

Now, Moriarty and 48 HOURS take a new look at the case and present it to a jury today to see if they can separate fact from fable.

“Every generation has … that one really terrible case that we don’t have any answers to,” says Andrew Schweighardt, a criminalist with the New York City Office of the Chief Medical Examiner.

48 HOURS and Moriarty brought together a group of jurors, male and female, to reexamine the case by hearing the evidence originally presented to 12 men in 1893. Moriarty is in the room for their deliberations, delivering a rare look inside a group of people talking their way through the evidence and deciding the fate of another human. What verdict did the new jury reach? The result might be surprising.

48 HOURS: “Lizzie Borden Took an Axe” is produced by Josh Gelman. Hannah Vair is the associate producer. George Baluzy, Greg McLaughlin and Mike Vele are the editors. Patti Aronofsky is the senior producer. Nancy Kramer is the executive story editor. Judy Tygard is the executive producer.

The show airs at 10:00 p.m. on Saturday, March 28 on the CBS Television Network.