Hallmark continues to surprise us with yet another crime thriller, “True Justice: Family Ties” (2024), where the audience will no longer complain about almost anything except for sudden cuts. But, since it is a TV movie, this film deserves to be appreciated on a different level and obviously demands the attention of a larger audience than other Hallmark movies. The film’s writing is so engaging that you might wonder at times if you are watching a better-than-average thriller from a big production house. The story keeps its originality throughout its course, as the performances from Katherine McNamara and Markian Tarasiuk steal the spotlight in most of the places. So, without further ado, let’s jump into the film’s plot. Spoilers Ahead!
True Justice: Family Ties (2024) Plot Summary and Movie Synopsis:
The film starts with Marcus Barlowe being found at a crime scene where a woman named Devina Adams is lying dead. Marcus tries to flee the scene with Devina’s necklace in his hand. But the police have covered him from all over the place. Marcus has nowhere to run as the police take him into custody, awaiting for the jury to pass their judgment. As time progresses, we see that the evidence clearly suggests that Marcus is the only person who is capable of killing Devina on that night. Therefore, the juries pass their judgment, pointing to him as guilty. Marcus receives life imprisonment as he looks helplessly toward his sister, Casey.
Casey Barlowe is a law student who tries her best to help Marcus in that situation. However, she fails to save her brother from the crime the jurors think he has committed. Casey assures Marcus that she will try everything to help so that she is able to save him from this huge misunderstanding. Casey, along with PJ and Sarah, two of her best friends in the college, starts investigating the whole matter closely. Moreover, Casey manages to manipulate her archrival in the college, Eli Flint, Devina’s boyfriend, into helping her save her brother. Eli does not agree in the beginning. However, knowing that something is fishy about the investigation, he agrees to find the real killer.
What does Casey find about Devina?
The team starts to pull up strings from different angles. They find out that on Devina’s watch, there are fingerprints of a person. Nevertheless, this person is not Marcus. So, PJ brings out the names of the three possible suspects who can be responsible for Devina’s murder. She was found a mark of strangulation, and that too of a boat rope. When Casey revisits the place where Devina’s body was found, an eyewitness confirms that Devina was often seen with an older person. Casey shows him a picture of Devina’s boyfriend, Eli. But the man says that it’s a different guy; he looked a lot richer.
After a confrontation with Eli, Casey confirms that the person Devina was seeing is Kurt Teller. Eli says that he has known Kurt through his father, and he is not the kind of person one tends to mess with. Meanwhile, one of Casey’s well-wishers, D.A. Quinn, sends her a piece of paper that mentions another girl who is killed, and in the police investigation, Kurt even admitted having a relationship with her. However, Kurt’s confession was never released publicly because he is acquainted with powerful people. PJ’s friend, Liam, who is a part-time hacker, joins the investigation and starts monitoring Kurt’s movements.
How do Casey and Eli plan to meet Rachel Teller?
To get to Kurt, Casey and her team plan to invest more time with his wife, Rachel Teller. Rachel is a very popular interior designer who does not have much time for any client apart from the ones that make it to her calendar. So, Liam hacks into her calendar and schedules a meeting with a newly married couple, Michael Madison and Mia, played skillfully by Casey and Eli. Meanwhile, Casey seeks favor from her friend Sarah, borrowing a vacant loft room from her father. Casey and Eli tell Rachel that they need to decorate the loft for their business. Rachel agrees to it as Liam takes care of it.
Liam has successfully managed to grab Kurt’s fingerprint. While they check it to find out whether the fingerprints on the watch match Kurt’s, the results are significantly twisted. First, it does not match with Kurt, and second, the fingerprint is not even in the database. This means the killer can be anyone. The twist does not stop here, as later one night, when Liam goes back to Kurt’s office to receive the camera from outside that he had already set before, he finds out that Kurt is lying dead inside the room.
True Justice: Family Ties (2024) Movie Ending Explained:
Who killed Kurt?
Casey thinks that she has got a break in the case as she finds out about a ring that Devina carried with her always but seemed to be missing when the body was found. However, Eli admits that he has the ring as he had lied to her about not meeting Devina the day she was killed. When confronted, Eli confesses that Devina had told him to run away with Kurt as they were in love. Knowing this, in despair, Eli asks to give back his proposal ring, and since he does not want to be the primary suspect in the case, he has lied about it so far.
Later, Casey goes to Devina’s father, Frank, to share the news that Eli lied about not seeing Devina on the day of her death. In the meantime, Liam shares the footage from last night. It shows Frank entering Kurt’s office right before his death. Frank confesses to accidentally killing Kurt after Casey reopened the case and informed him on a previous occasion that Devina was seeing an older man. Anyway, Liam enters the house at that time. With Casey’s help, Frank is taken into custody. Liam has an audio recording of the events, and with Kurt’s confession right before his death, Frank will be freed under self-defense.
Why was Devina killed?
Liam discovers that Kurt always uses his second phone to call other women. In fact, his primary phone was used only for his wife, Rachel. However, on the night of the murder, Devina received a phone call from Kurt’s primary phone. This simply proves that the call was made by Rachel. However, they do not have enough evidence against her or an eyewitness who can confirm Rachel’s presence at that moment. Luckily, even though her husband is dead, Rachel agrees to join the meeting with the couple about the design of the loft.
Casey decides to go solo on this, as with Eli’s presence, Rachel will never confess to anything. When Rachel enters the loft, Eli brings forth Devina’s name, and Rachel’s attitude changes quickly. She says that Devina was threatening to destroy everything that Rachel and Kurt built together. Rachel could not risk losing everything they had created together so far. So, basically, it was not jealousy that killed Devina. It was rather the fear of losing something precious that took away the life of that young lady.
Rachel admits that she has killed Devina and then attacks Casey. Liam and Eli come running to save her from Rachel. They have already placed cameras inside the loft. Seeing all the evidence and Rachel’s on-camera confession, the judge announces Marcus as innocent and sets him free immediately. Casey rejects the D.A. office job. Instead, she asks for the conviction integrity unit for her last year of internship. Eli and Casey become good friends, while Liam talks about another case that sets up the stage for a sequel — only if the makers are up for it.
