The True Story Behind Netflix's What Jennifer Did, Explained
There are few things more terrifying than the idea of a home invasion, especially one that ends in violence. So when reports first broke of a 2010 home invasion in the relatively sleepy Toronto suburb of Marham, Ontario that left one person dead and one in a coma, people were understandably shaken. Police, however, had reason to doubt the story told to them by the victims' daughter, 24-year-old Jennifer Pan, who was left allegedly restrained but unhurt and was able to call police. As the details of that tragic November evening began to emerge, the world learned that Pan had potentially orchestrated the entire event and hired the "home invaders" to kill her parents. In 2015, Pan was sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years for the murder of her mother and the attempted murder of her father, with similar sentences for her accomplices as well.
There is renewed public interest in the Jennifer Pan case with the new Netflix documentary "What Jennifer Did," directed by Jenny Popplewell. Compiling footage from police interviews and interviews with those close to the case, the documentary seeks to share the story that shocked Canada and Toronto's immigrant community with the whole world.
An unusual and disturbing case
One of the things that makes the Pan case so compelling is Pan herself, who went from being a straight-A student to lying to her parents about her grades and forging documents in order to maintain that lie. There are hours of footage of her three extensive interrogations with Canadian law enforcement, and it's fascinating to see her demeanor change as her story changes. This young woman who confidently lied about graduating high school, attending college, and doing an internship at a hospital initially thought that she would be able to lie to police just as easily, but eventually her stories all fell apart. Instead of college, she was mostly spending time with her on-and-off-again boyfriend, drug dealer Danny Wong. Her parents started to grow suspicious and reportedly her father Hann followed her to her internship one day, catching her in a lie. Shortly after that her continued relationship with Wong was discovered, leading to increased tensions in the Pan household.
Over the course of police interrogations and investigation, they learned that Jennifer Pan and Wong hired a hitman and two of his associates to kill her parents in order for her to inherit their substantial wealth. Alleged hitman Eric Carty, along with Lenford Crawford and David Mylvaganam, went into the Pan home and made demands for money before shooting both Pan parents several times in the head, killing mother Bich and grievously wounding Hann.
What drives a daughter to murder?
The documentary not only details the police investigation and media reaction in the greater Toronto area surrounding this bizarre crime, but also seeks to understand why Jennifer did what she did and how similar events could be prevented in the future. Interviews with people who knew Jennifer Pan paint her as lonely and with little self-worth, often showing intense devotion to Wong without showing the same kind of love to herself. Her having her parents killed wasn't just the act of a cold-blooded killer out for financial gain, but she had plenty of other personal motivations as well ranging from her toxic condemned romance with Wong to her parents potential discovery of the full extent of her lies. Someone might have been able to intervene at some point, though there are no easy answers (and thankfully the documentary doesn't try to offer any).
Pan's interviews with police make for fascinating viewing because it allows the audience to try and decode her motivations for themselves. Coupled with interviews with people who knew her, a more complex and complete portrait of a young woman who felt like a disappointment and didn't know how to ask for help emerges. We will never truly know how much the Pan family's strict upbringing and high expectations of Jennifer led to her disastrous decision, but it's clear that she felt that she had been pushed too far, even claiming that she had hired the hitmen to kill her instead, because she was "such a disappointment."
Another true crime hit for Netflix
In the end, Pan, Wong, Crawford, and Mylvaganam were all sentenced to life in prison with 25 years before they became eligible for parole, while Carty died in prison on a different murder charge while awaiting trial. Hann recovered from his injuries and he and his son, Jennifer's brother, have a non-communication request issued against Jennifer so that she can never contact either of them again.
Pan's case has been documented in true crime shows and podcasts previously, including an episode of the so-bad-it's-good Investigation Discovery series "Deadly Women," which relies on campy re-enactments instead of the doc's more restrained take. Netflix has become an online hub for true crime documentary films and series, with big, wild series like "Tiger King" blowing everyone's minds and even more recent, less exploitative fare like "Lover, Stalker, Killer" has done really well for the streamer. "What Jennifer Did" is another in a long line of Netflix docs bringing unusual true crime cases to everyone's living rooms. Soon most of us will know what Jennifer did, but we'll always be wondering why.