General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20266 min read

Murder Among the Mormons

Murder Among the Mormons is a 2021 American three-part true-crime documentary series on Netflix about the October 1985 Salt Lake City pipe bombings and the document forger Mark Hofmann, whose crimes shook the Latter-day Saint community and threatened to undermine the historical foundations of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.¹ It was directed by Jared Hess, known for Napoleon Dynamite, and Tyler Measom, known for An Honest Liar, and premiered on March 3, 2021.¹^•²

Key fact	Detail
Format	Three-part documentary crime limited series, TV-14, English language, one season²
Premiere	March 3, 2021, on Netflix²
Directors	Jared Hess and Tyler Measom¹
Production	A BBC Studios Production; executive producers Joe Berlinger, Ryan O'Dowd, Jared Hess, and Tyler Measom; produced by Jannat Gargi¹
Subject	The 1985 Salt Lake City bombings that killed Steven Christensen and Kathleen Sheets and injured Mark Hofmann, a dealer and forger of historical documents³
Critical reception	89% average Tomatometer from 19 reviews and 76% Popcornmeter from more than 100 ratings on Rotten Tomatoes²
Portrayal	Chris Richards plays Mark Hofmann; John Michael May plays Shannon Flynn²

Spoilers

The story it covers

The series reconstructs the events of October 15, 1985, when two people were killed by pipe bombs rigged in packages wrapped in brown paper. The victims were Steven Christensen, a stockbroker, Mormon bishop, and document collector, and Kathleen Sheets, the wife of Christensen's former business associate Gary Sheets. Hofmann, then 30, became a suspect when a third bomb exploded in his car the next day, seriously injuring him.³ In the blackened interior of his car, investigators found pipes and other bomb-making equipment along with rare books and documents relating to the Mormon Church.⁴

The forgeries behind the violence. Hofmann had spent years forging and dealing historical documents, including several purportedly written by early members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Two of his fabrications, the so-called Salamander Letter and the McLellin Collection, threatened to shake the foundations of the church by undermining some of its most important teachings.³ The Salamander Letter, a letter attributed to Martin Harris and dated 1830, claimed that Joseph Smith was led to the Book of Mormon plates by a spirit who had "transfigured himself from a white salamander in the bottom of the hole" where the plates were buried.⁵ Christensen had paid a reported $40,000 for the letter in 1983.⁴ Checks and other evidence found after the bombings showed Christensen had just paid Hofmann more than $100,000 in connection with rare historical documents pertaining to the church.⁶

The series also documents the aftermath. Investigators found irregularities in the ink on Hofmann's documents, revealing them to be forgeries, and Hofmann said he had amassed debts and taken advance payment for documents he did not possess and had not forged.⁷ After a lengthy investigation, he admitted guilt as part of a plea deal, to two counts of second-degree murder along with two counts of theft by deception, an agreement that spared him from potentially facing execution.³ According to the church's own historical topic page on the Hofmann forgeries, Hofmann was a church member who had privately stopped believing in God, and his forgeries included letters attributed to Joseph Smith, Lucy Mack Smith, and David Whitmer.⁵

Production

Hess and Measom, who were both raised in the Mormon faith, built the series from archival footage, home videos, dramatic reenactments, and interviews with people connected to Hofmann personally or to the case.³ Hofmann himself did not appear; the directors instead used his confession tapes, recorded after his conviction.⁸ The title came from an archival national news report from the time that said, "There's murder among the Mormons."

The directors structured the series as a delayed reveal. Because the story remained largely regional, Measom noted that many viewers came in without knowing the outcome, which allowed the series to suspend the whodunit for an episode and a half and then show how and why Hofmann did it.³ Hess described Hofmann as "the greatest forger of all time" from the perspective of viewers encountering the story cold, and noted that the FBI, Sotheby's, universities, and historical institutions had all been duped by him.³

Reception

The series drew broadly positive reviews. On Rotten Tomatoes it holds an 89% average Tomatometer from 19 reviews and a 76% Popcornmeter audience score.² Critics praised its restraint and depth; one review called it "how you make a true crime documentary," while another noted that the filmmakers were more interested in the story around the document trade than in the church itself.⁹ The Harvard Crimson found the three-hour runtime too short for the story's many subplots, judging that the series "touches on a lot, but explores little in depth," while still concluding that it did the complex story justice.¹⁰

Response within the Latter-day Saint community. Reactions varied. A Deseret News round-up of Latter-day Saint history experts argued that the series had value as a record, capturing first-person oral histories from family members, associates, historians, journalists, and police investigators, while noting it was not an analysis of the link between Latter-day Saint theology and history or of the challenges Hofmann's forgeries posed to the faith.¹¹ A BYU Studies Quarterly assessment found that accusations that the church had suppressed the troubling documents seemed "both understandable and overstated," and praised the series for foregrounding the human impact of the story.¹² Hess said the Mormon community's response had been positive, and that for the church as an institution "there aren't any surprises" in the story.³

Place in Latter-day Saint media

The series arrived amid a broader surge of Latter-day Saint stories on television and streaming, alongside Under the Banner of Heaven on Hulu, Tokyo Vice on HBO Max, and Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey on Netflix. Commentators linked the trend to Mitt Romney's 2012 presidential campaign and the musical The Book of Mormon, and observed that Mormonism appears matched with the true-crime genre with notable frequency.¹³ The Hofmann bombings themselves have continued to generate retellings in books and on screen, with the Netflix series described as the most recent hit among them.⁷

References

Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Series and fictional screen worlds › Unscripted, reality, and web-native series › Documentary, docudrama, and lifestyle series › True crime and investigative docuseries › Premiered 2006 to 2022

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

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