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Dateline: Unforgettable is all set to return with a new episode this week, delving into the complicated case of Mark Harshbarger's death. The case balanced on the very thin line between an accident due to negligence and a cleverly planned and executed murder.
Titled Out of the Darkness, the episode will air on August 9, 2022 at 8 pm ET on Oxygen.
Mark's wife, Mary Beth Harshbarger, shot him while on a hunting trip in Canada. Mary Beth allegedly thought that Mark was a black bear and fired a shot at him in the twilight hours of September 14, 2006.
She faced one count of criminal negligence before being cleared of the charges by Justice Richard LeBlanc of the Supreme Court of Newfoundland and Labrador in 2010. With all the evidence pointing in Mary Beth's favor, it is safe to say that Mark Harshbarger's death was an accident.
Read on for more details about the fascinating and complicated case of hunting gone wrong.
Why was Mark Harshbarger's death ruled out as an accident?
Mark Harshbarger's death came with its set of complications, the first being whether any malicious intent was behind the shooting of the Pennsylvania man. Early testimonies and rumors indicated that there was a greater scheme involved in the death of Mark.
One of the rumors was that Mark's brother, Barry, had been romantically involved with Mary Beth and Mark's murder could clear the way for the two of them. Additionally, Mark's father, Lee Harshbarger, also said, "The circumstances all look otherwise. It was not an accident."
Mary Beth allegedly claimed that she thought her approaching husband was a black bear and took the shot. Guide Lambert Greene testified at the start of her trial that she became hysterical when she realized that she fired at her husband. "She danced around the road. 'I shot my husband. I shot my love,'" Greene recalled.
RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) staged two re-enactments of the entire scenario, trying to see Mary Beth's perspective. Officers concluded that it was indeed a possible explanation for Mark Harshbarger's death.
During her trial, Justice Richard LeBlanc said that there wasn't enough evidence to prove that Mary Beth purposefully breached the standard of care expected of hunters.
The judge further blamed Mark's death on "a constellation of unfortunate facts that reasonably caused Mrs. Harshbarger to believe she was shooting at a bear." The judge concluded that Mary Beth had good reason to believe that her husband was a bear.
A pathologist's evidence also indicated that Mark was leaning forward when he was shot, which perhaps made his stature look like a bear at that moment.
Mark's father was not satisfied with this decision and 77-year-old Lee Harshbarger, who appeared in court for all the days of the trial, said:
"This kind of decision says that it's okay to shoot at a black mass,...If you don't positively identify it and if anybody goes out there on an ATV with their dark coat and they go down one of those trails and somebody shoots them, that's saying it's okay."
Mark Harshbarger's death was ultimately ruled out as an accident.
Dateline: Unforgettable will dive deeper into the case and explore all the avenues when it airs on Oxygen at 8 pm ET on August 9, 2022.
