An innocent man Juan Catalan was saved from his death penalty after a popular American TV show broadcast the actual evidence of Juan’s alibi. After he was accused of a murder he did not even commit, Juan now pretty much owes his life to an American sitcom.
The show that saved the man’s life is Curb Your Enthusiasm, starring actor and comedian Larry David. The story of the show follows the life of David as a TV producer and writer, who experiences various misadventures with his celebrity friends around Los Angeles.
Juan Catalan spent nearly 6 months in jail for the murder of a teenage girl until his lawyer found unused footage from HBO’s “Curb Your Enthusiasm” that proved he’d been at a Dodgers game with his 6-year-old daughter at the time of the crime pic.twitter.com/a0GPk3KKCv
— Con Spiracy (@ConFactor) June 15, 2020
However, ‘The Car Pool Lane’, the sixth episode of season 4, proved to be extremely significant. A woman named Martha Puebla was cruelly murdered in California on May 12, 2003, the same day that Curb Your Enthusiasm filmed that iconic episode. The Los Angeles Dodgers played the Atlanta Braves on that same day. She had testified against a group in a murder trial that included Juan’s brother, Mario Catalan, the week before she passed away.
Naturally, Juan has a clear reason for committing the act when Puebla is killed the week after. He asserted, however, that he was 20 miles from the scene of Puebla’s murder, at the Dodgers game, when the crime was committed.
According to Juan’s testimony, he attended the game with his buddy Ruben, his cousin, and his six-year-old daughter. In court, he used his tickets as an alibi, but this was insufficient to establish his location.
The prosecutor Juan and his legal team had a perfect conviction rate, and she was not going to overlook that in this case. Juan could have easily bought the tickets and not gone, therefore they weren’t evidence of his whereabouts.
He therefore desperately required proof that he was at the game with his family. Then he recalled seeing ‘Super Dave Osborne’ at the game, who played Larry Funkhouser on Curb Your Enthusiasm. His crew was desperate to uncover proof of his location because he was facing the death penalty.
In 2003, Juan Catalan spent nearly 6 months in jail for the murder of a teenage girl until his lawyer found unused footage from HBO’s TV show Curb Your Enthusiasm.
The footage proved that Catalan had been at a Dodger’s game with his 6-year-old daughter at the time of the… pic.twitter.com/upSy4J5E62
— Morbid Knowledge (@Morbidful) February 8, 2024
Todd Melnik, Juan’s attorney, contacted the media department right away to inquire about who was filming on the Dodgers game day. Melnik was able to meet with Larry David after verifying that it was indeed HBO, and they showed him their match tape. Indeed, Juan and his daughter were captured on video at the snack kiosk.
He was found not guilty of Puebla’s murder after seeing this video and his phone pinging at a tower close to Dodger Stadium at 10:12 PM, 31 minutes before her passing. Juan was paid a $320,000 settlement and released from jail after being found not guilty after six months.
Puebla also received justice because the four individuals who killed her were apprehended by the FBI.
