How Johnny Depp’s ‘Brother’ Damien Echols Inspired a Character on ‘Stranger Things’ Season 4
Johnny Depp said he feels like he’s gotten his life back in the wake of the verdict in his defamation case against his ex Amber Heard. But he was also once involved in getting three other people off death row when he believed they were innocent of the horrific crimes they were accused of.
One of those individuals is Damien Echols, who once said Depp became “like a brother” to him after his release. Read on to find out how Echols and two others landed on death row. Plus, learn how the story inspired a popular character in the fourth season of Netflix’s Stranger Things.
What happened to Damien Echols?
Echols was a teenager living in West Memphis, Arkansas, when authorities accused him and two of his peers of a horrific triple homicide. The 1993 crime involved three children, and investigators zeroed in on three teenagers as prime suspects.
Some argued the prosecuting team built a case founded on rampant “Satanic Panic” in the early ’90s. Investigators linked their teenage interests to perceived ritualistic aspects of the crime. The argument compelled a court to find them guilty for debatable reasons.
They went off to death row in 1994 and eventually became known as the West Memphis Three. But the gradual availability of new testing began casting evidential doubt on their involvement in the crime.
A chilling true-crime documentary called Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills drew the attention of Hollywood stars like Depp to the case. There was a considerable effort to convince a court to take another close look at the evidence under the scope of new science.
In 2011, the West Memphis Three all walked off death row after approximately 18 years. They accomplished that partly by using money raised by celebrities to pay for tests and legal fees. But they also used an Alford plea, as explained by the Thomas Jefferson School of Law.
“The Alford plea is treated as a guilty plea for sentencing, yet allows the individual using it to maintain their innocence,” they shared.
How did Damien Echols influence ‘Stranger Things’ season 4?
Some fans of Stranger Things might notice parts of the story are a bit familiar. And that’s because they were used in the fourth season of the show.
Ross Duffer said in an interview with Netflix, “… Something we really wanted to get into this year was the ‘Satanic Panic.’ So that brought us back to the Paradise Lost documentary series with the [West] Memphis Three, and it brought us back to Damien Echols.”
“We really wanted that character who’s a metalhead, he’s into Dungeons & Dragons, he’s ultimately a true nerd at heart. But from an outsider’s point of view, they may go, ‘This is someone that is scary.’ So that’s really where the idea for Eddie came in,” he further explained.
How does Johnny Depp know Damien Echols?
In an AP interview, Depp said the injustice against Echols was one he could not swallow, so he reached out to the accused. Echols said the two-time Sexiest Man Alive “didn’t just support [them] … in prison,” he stayed on their side “every single step of the way.”
Echols told E! News, “We did the book signing the other night in New York, and he was there for that, you know? Obviously, this isn’t helping his career in any way. This is something he is doing entirely to help me.”
“We’ve grown to love him dearly. He’s become like a brother to me,” he concluded of his friendship with the Edward Scissorhands star. The brotherly friends even got commemorative tattoos.
Since Echols was released, he has pushed to re-test evidence in the 1993 case. He said he hopes to prove that he and his co-defendants are innocent and find justice for the victims.
