United States of Injustice

The subject of this post is a difficult one to broach and I admit that I have started and then deleted my thoughts on more than one occasion but then when the topic is as emotive as this its never going to be easy to express an opinion, especially when you're trying to be impartial despite your personal feelings.

So what am I talking about? Its the topic that the entire world seems to be losing its collective minds over right now, the Netflix documentary Making a Murderer.

Making a Murderer is a 10 part documentary which was written and directed by two student film makers Laura Ricciardi and Moira Demos who in 2005 were looking for an idea for a project when they happened to stumble across the story of Steven Avery. Avery lived in Manitowoc County, Wisconsin where he and his family ran a salvage business and he was I think its fair to say something of a troubled soul. When he was 18 he was charged with burgulary and served 10 months, then in 1982 he was convicted of animal cruelty when he and a friend poured gasoline onto a cat before throwing it either over or onto a fire (depending on which version of events you choose to believe). Three years later he was charged with assaulting his cousin who he ran off the road at gunpoint, the interesting point of this particular incident is that the cousin was the wife of a part time Manitowoc County Sheriff.For this crime Avery was sentenced to 6 years in prison.

Around this time he was also charged with the sexual assault and attempted murder of Penny Beernstn, a crime that he was given 30 years for which were to be served concurrently with the 6 years he was serving for the earlier crime. Avery claoimed at the time that he was innocent of the assault of Beernstn and he maintained his innocence for the next 18 years. In 2002 the Wisconsin Innocence Project took up Stevens case and with advances in DNA testing they were able to prove that he was indeed innocent, this led to his release in 2003.

Had the story ended there it would have been bad enough but the fact of the matter is that there were many mistakes made by the police at the time of Stevens conviction, now whether these were deliberate as part of a campaign to lock Steven up regardless of whether he did it or not or just genuine oversights is up to you the viewer to decide but the point made in the documentary is that it certainly seems that certain members of the local police force had it in for Steven Avery and did their level best to not only lock him up but also to ignore potential leads that would have proved his innocence long before the Innocence Project got involved.

Now a free man Avery sued the county for his wrongful incarceration and the sum that he was after was a cool $36,000,000. Due to the finances of the county a large part of the payout would have come from the individuals involved which obviously did not sit well with any of them, not that any of this mattered as on October 31st 2005 a photographer by the name of Teresa Halbach disappeared whilst she was out on assignment taking pictures of vehicles to be sold in the local Auto-Trader. One of the stops she was due to make that day was at the Avery salvage yard, a stop that Avery himself claims she made before leaving to go on to another house in which a couple by the name of Zipperer lived.

Less than two weeks later (November 11th) Steven Avery was arrested on suspicion of murdering Teresa after her car and fragments of her body were found on his property, again Avery was adamant that he was innocent claiming that the police were framing him in order to stop his lawsuit regarding his wrongful arrest in 1985.

Now this is where the whole thing gets really messy and to be perfectly honest nothing I write here can do the story justice, therefore I would strongly recommend that if you haven't seen Making a Murderer then you should make it a top priority to do so, not only to see what al the fuss is about but to witness first hand the sherr lunacy of what exactly happened.

With that said I will try to convey the main issues -

As previously stated Ricciardi and Demos stumbled across Averys story when they heard about the murder charge and from there they travelled to Manitowoc to begin filming everything. Over the next ten years they filmed over 700 hours of footage as they followed Steven, his family and his lawyers throughout the course of the trial.

The police also charged Stevens nephew Brendan Dassey with aiding his uncle with Teresas murder. Now at the time Brendan was only 16 years old and clearly suffers from learning problems, in fact he is said to have an IQ of only 70. The first time he spoke to police he stated that he had never seen Teresa and that knew nothing about her murder. Several months later however when the police decided to treat him as a person of interest he told them that he had seen Teresa tied up in his uncles bedroom, had raped her and then slit her throat. As cut and dry as this sounds however the 4 hours of video that was taken of his interrogation have to be seen to be believed. Two incredibly experienced detectives took Brendan out of school and without offering him a lawyer or the chance to have his mother in attendence (which is the first shocker of this matter) . They then interrogated him for hours and coerced him into confessing to a crime that in my opinion he clearly did not commit. Yes this is just my take on the matter but I defy anyone to watch the whole tape and not come to the same conclusion that I have, it is disgusting and unbelievable in equal measure and the fact that he ended up being found guilty by a jury is one of the most ridiculous things I have ever seen. Yes I know that the prosecution point to the documentary not showing all of the tape but I have tracked it down and watched it and frankly how all the officers involved have not been fired is mindboggling regardless of the fact that this is apparently the accepted way that these types of interrogations are carried out (there are other ongoing cases where teenagers have been railroaded in this manner which are also being looked at as I write this).

Brendan was not charged until March 2006, the film hints at this event taking place because the police needed more ammunition to make their case stick against Steven. If this is actually true then it makes Brendans story all the more tragic.

The police force that had been involved in Stevens false conviction were supposed to be kept away from the investigation into Teresas murder but they were in fact heavily involved, it is this fact that leads to much of the argument of the planting of some evidence as well as evidence tampering too.

I'm not going to go into all the specifics regarding keys appearing after 7 seperate searches or the lack of certain evidence that would have backed up the 'confession' that was given by Brendan as again I recommend that you search out the series yourself and form your own opinion as to the rights and wrongs of what happened, apologises if this seems like a cop-out but to cover the whole story would make for a serious long read.

The short version ends with both Steven and Brendan being convicted, Steven for life without parole (as the judge considers him to be a threat to society) and Brendan for life with the chance of parole in 2048 at which time he would be almost 60 years old. Since the documentary aired everybody who has seen it has had an opinion one way or the other, for every person who sees an injustice and a shocking coruption of power there is somebody else who believes in the prosecution and is happy that a man they consider to be a murderer is locked away with no chance of release.

Speaking of the prosecution they have, in response to the documentary, been extremely vocal in their condemnation of what was shown, claiming that Ricciardi and Demos left out hugely important parts of the trial that proved Stevens and Brendans guilt whilst in response the film makers state that they kept in all of the best arguments that the prosecution made and the fact that people have seen this and found it highly flawed is proof that the conviction was a joke.

Whilst it has now become a case of he said/she said the one thing that Making a Murderer has done is shine a light on a justice system that is clearly very flawed, I don't think anyone can argue this point regardless of their opinion on the guilt of the parties involved. Quite aside from the improper conduct of the officers involved the sheer fact that a court and a jury (which in itself it has been claimed was compromised and was heavily influenced by the coverage of the case in the media) could overlook the manner in which the case was built against the men is something that should make us all question the way in which these things are done. I should point out that I live in the UK and therefore am not impacted as directly as anyone actually living within the borders of the United States but I am not niave enough to believe that this is just an American problem, wherever there is power there will always be the opportunity to use it in a corrupt manner but then I guess thats all part of human nature.

So the question of course is did Steven Avery kill Teresa Holbach and did Brendan Dassey aid him in the crime? I've already made it clear that it is my belief that Brendan is guilty of no crime and should never have lost the last ten years of his life to prison. As for Steven well that is another matter entirely. Do I think he did it? Well I cannot say that I am completely convinced that he didn't but the issue comes with the way in which his conviction was obtained, it was done so fraudulently that its impossible to say that Steven deserves to be in prison and at the very least he should be given a fair shake of the stick by way of a retrial. That way if he is guilty then at least it can be done proven in a correct and proper manner which will leave no room for any further argument.

Making a Murderer will certainly give you food for thought and prompt serious discussion between anybody who sees it and that is a good thing. That said however you have to go into viewing it with an open mind and a pinch of salt as much the same as any other documentary the final product is skewed to the personal opinion of those that made it. In this case its clear that Ricciardi and Demos believe in the innocence of both men and whilst there is nothing wrong with this you have to take this into account as you watch. Since Netflix released this documentary however the internet (in particular Youtube) has become awash with videos and blogs regarding the events that unfolded and this has made it possible to review every aspect of the case including the parts that weren't in the show and its from looking at some of this extra evidence that I have become further convinced of Brendans innocence.

At the time of writing this review both Brendan and Steven have new representation fighting their corner and in Stevens case the claim is that there is new DNA evidence that will not only prove his innocence but also reveal who did kill Teresa Holbach. Making a Murderer may have finished but this story still has a long way to go before it is played out to its conclusion, I for one will be watching what happens and hoping that eventually the truth will out and justice will be served regardless of what they actually is. Sadly nobody can say that this will never happen again but if in raising the profile of this case others who have suffered similar injustices are given a voice then that will at least be something right?