Presumed Innocent – Season 1 Episode 8 Recap, Review & Ending Explained

Episode 8 Recap – The Verdict

The Presumed Innocent Episode 8 recap begins with Tommy finding a fire poker and a threatening note at his house. The police bag the evidence and Tommy tells Nico that he thinks Rusty put it there.

The evidence is brought to the judge and she tells the group that she’s happy to call it a mistrial. Raymond pulls Rusty aside and tells him it’s not a good idea for the jury to find out about the fire poker. At home, Rusty admits to Barbara that the fire poker is from Carolyn’s house. He says he recognised a chip in the handle.

The court sessions resume. Raymond questions a doctor who contradicts Dr Kumagai’s testimony. She puts the time of death between 1 am and 3 am while Kumagai said it was 10 pm. This is based on the food found in her body. Tommy cross-examines her and proves that the food could be from lunch or dinner and doesn’t mean anything.

Back home, Raymond says they need to prove that Rusty was home at midnight. Barbara is willing to testify for him but Mya says that’s not a good idea because the prosecution could use her to paint Rusty as a cheating husband. They decide to rest their case and Rusty insists he wants to give the closing statement.

Raymond goes home to Lorraine who is still worried about the toll this case has taken on him. Meanwhile, Rusty practices his closing speech. Jaden approaches him, also worried about him giving his own closing statement. But Rusty assures her that he’s got this. Read on for the full Presumed Innocent ending explained!

What does Rusty say during his closing statement?

The day arrives and Rusty starts his speech. He admits to betraying his family but insists that the evidence can’t prove that he killed Carolyn. He says he cared about Carolyn and wants to know who did this as much as anyone. He urges the jury to look at all the ways this case has reasonable doubt and to make the honourable decision.

Now, it’s Tommy’s turn to give his closing statement. He says that if Rusty wanted to catch the killer, he had the opportunity to do so when he headed the investigation. He paints Rusty as obsessive, volatile and given to bursts of violence.

Is Rusty pronounced guilty or not guilty?

As they wait for the jury to deliberate, Rusty thinks about a memory with Carolyn where they waited on the jury for one of their cases. Tommy is jittery as well. Nico asks him how much he loved Carolyn but Eugenia interrupts and tells them the verdict is here.

Everybody files back into the courtroom and the verdict is read out. Rusty is found not guilty! Everybody is relieved and the family heads back home. Rusty speaks to the press and tells them that the prosecution should have done more to find Carolyn’s real killer. Nico tries to appease Tommy by saying he did his best. He then tells Tommy to move on.

Who really killed Carolyn?

Back home, Rusty approaches Barbara. He then says that he knew it from the beginning and he did what he did to protect Barbara and their family. He reveals that he knows the truth — Barbara killed Carolyn. He admits he went back to Carolyn’s place that night and found her dead.

He realised the culprit was Barbara and so he tied Carolyn up to put suspicion on Liam Reynolds. He also knows that Barbara put the poker in Tommy’s house. But Barbara denies everything and we soon find out why. Jaden enters the room and admits that it was her.  

How does Presumed Innocent end?

Here is the ending explained of Presumed Innocent: Jaden describes what happened. She went to Carolyn’s house just to confront her and tell her to stay away from Rusty and their family. When Carolyn revealed she was pregnant, Jaden lost her cool and hit her with a fire poker. The next day she buried the poker and later put it in Tommy’s apartment.

At present, both parents seem devastated. Rusty takes on the blame himself, and tells Jaden to believe that he put this all in motion and that she did what she did out of protection and self-defence. He hugs her and assures his family that they love each other and will stick together. Time goes by and we see the Sabich family spending time together and even sharing meals with Raymond and Lorraine. And that’s the end of the Episode 8 recap of Presumed Innocent.

Episode 8 Review

The Presumed Innocent finale is like most of the season’s episodes, steady but slow. The episode lingers during moments that seem unnecessary, like the conversation between Raymond and his wife. There’s a lot of waiting and watching characters wait and mull over the situation, but the passivity of it all takes away from the show’s mystery. The end twist is the only redeeming factor and that’s because it is the final reveal of Carolyn’s murderer’s identity.

Rusty’s conversation with Barbara is an intriguing one and for a second there it does feel like Barbara is the real murderer. Jaden’s confession has all the marks of a great plot twist. It’s unexpected and shocking but fits the bill. It makes sense that Rusty would go to such lengths to protect his family.

But while the ending offers up a delicious twist reveal, it is not enough to cover for the series’ flaws as a whole. We don’t know much about Jaden, the culprit herself, and have no insight into how she was pushed to such extreme action. In the end, this finale remains as average as the rest of the show.