Making a Murderer-Netlfix

I concede that you are really talking about whether the State had enough to convict, and I'm talking more strictly about guilt or innocence. If I were a juror, I would have weighed all the evidence as objectively as I could, and certainly would have voted to acquit if it was proven to me that the State planted evidence or engaged in other misconduct.

Which is why I have a hard time understanding how the documentary could produce so many instances of flagrant police and prosecutorial misconduct, yet Avery's very competent legal team could not get a single juror to believe any of it and vote to acquit. I do not accept your contention in a subsequent post that jurors from small towns are too stupid to be objective and fair, and can be easily influenced by the media. There are smart and dumb people everywhere.

And the internet was in full force in 2005, as someone who runs a web site should well know.

Freedom Trail wrote:

Which is why I have a hard time understanding how the documentary could produce so many instances of flagrant police and prosecutorial misconduct, yet Avery's very competent legal team could not get a single juror to believe any of it and vote to acquit. I do not accept your contention in a subsequent post that jurors from small towns are too stupid to be objective and fair, and can be easily influenced by the media. There are smart and dumb people everywhere.

It seems that most of the jurors initially voted to acquit.

And three of them strongly wanted to convict.

That's a hung jury unless one group can convict the other group to change their minds.

The courts do not want a mistrial.

There is a lot of pressure on the jurors to present a unanimous decision.

If the jurors that want to convict are stronger willed, they will have more influence over the other jurors then the attorneys.

Also, if you have a conviction, the defendant can appeal.

If the defendant is acquitted, he can never be tried again for this crime.

The system puts everything on the jurors, who are not professionally trained in legal matters.

And they can be corrupted as well.

Freedom Trail wrote:

Which is why I have a hard time understanding how the documentary could produce so many instances of flagrant police and prosecutorial misconduct, yet Avery's very competent legal team could not get a single juror to believe any of it and vote to acquit. I do not accept your contention in a subsequent post that jurors from small towns are too stupid to be objective and fair, and can be easily influenced by the media. There are smart and dumb people everywhere.

The exact thing you describe happened to him with the wrongful conviction for rape. Rewatch that first episode if you have any doubt that he was railroaded in that trial.

Avery did not have a competent legal team in his rape trial.

He had a public defender.

And it's the money he got in the settlement for that trial that did enable him to pay for good lawyers in the murder trial.

Without that settlement, he wouldn't have stood a chance at good defense for the murder trial.

Justice still seems to be based on money and class.

rojo wrote:

2) There is no explanation at all for the cop calling in Teresa's license plate number.

Yes there is. The detective gets a call or note to look for a '99 Toyota Rav4 with a certain license plate, he calls dispatch to confirm he has the correct numbers. In the call he says "'99 Toyota, right?". He can't know the exact year by looking at it. This make more sense than the idea that he was looking at it and knew what year it was.

The prosecutor and Sheriff's office are scum, but the call is not a problem for them.

rojo wrote: And if he murdered her in his home and burned her body right there, why would her blood be in the back of her car? And why would his blood be in the car?

In one of Brandon's confessions (probably coerced so take that for what it's worth), he said they first drove her body down to dump in the pond but came back when they saw the pond was dry. And Steve did have a cut finger.

So the sheriff's guys picked Theresa's teeth and jean rivets out of the fire to plant by Steve's place but left behind larger pelvic bone fragments (which were never shown to be Theresa's)?

not so much wrote:

rojo wrote: And if he murdered her in his home and burned her body right there, why would her blood be in the back of her car? And why would his blood be in the car?

In one of Brandon's confessions (probably coerced so take that for what it's worth), he said they first drove her body down to dump in the pond but came back when they saw the pond was dry. And Steve did have a cut finger.

For what it's worth, I don't think Brandon's confessions (and there was more than one, and not all of them were shown in the documentary) were coerced.

Leading questions? Sure. Coerced? No. At least not what I saw. Is Brandon not the brightest bulb in the tree? Absolutely. Can he tell right from wrong? Absolutely. Is he mentally retarded? No.

To me, coercing a confession would involve more direct threats. The investigators were more coaxing than coercing. And he volunteered a whole bunch of incredible detail that was not spoon-fed to him by someone else.

Should his attorney have been present for all questioning? Absolutely. But that's not the State's fault. We have an adversarial system. The State gets to operate as aggressively as it can within the limits of the law, and so does defense counsel. Mistakes get made, for sure. Innocent people unfortunately get convicted, and plenty of guilty people walk free.

Brandon confessed to murder and then asked if he would be done soon so he could go back to school.

He had no concept of what was going on.

"And he volunteered a whole bunch of incredible detail that was not spoon-fed to him by someone else."

That detail included things that just couldn't have happened because there would have been blood all over the place, impossible to clean up.

This is like getting a confession from a parrot that can produce words but doesn't know what it is saying.

Do you think Brandon did the things he said he did but later recanted?

I really enjoyed this article that came out two days ago. It shows you how the jury was influenced by 'facts' not presented at trial. http://www.thefrisky.com/2016-01-25/making-a-murderer-biased-journalism-necessary-outrage/

The Frisky wrote:

An Avery trial juror recently told In Touch that the jury found Avery guilty of “raping and torturing” Halbach, referring to the scenario laid out in Dassey’s retracted confession. But Dassey’s confession was never presented at Avery’s trial — it did, however, get plenty of airtime on the local news thanks to a press conference held by prosecutor Kratz months before. In other words, the jury apparently allowed inadmissible prosecutorial propaganda to influence their verdict — that’s far more concerning to me than allegations a documentary downplayed Avery’s criminal history and left imaginary “sweat DNA” on the cutting room floor.

The story also has an interesting fact. 27% of false convictions involve a false confession.

Probably not a popular opinion, but here are my $0.02.

I think that it is more likely than not that Avery murdered her, but I am not able to say that he did so beyond a reasonable doubt. However, I wasn't on the jury and so that is hard to opine on. Regardless, the missteps taken by the police and prosecutors should have been enough for a mistrial, regardless of how much evidence was present. Sometimes murderers will get away when law enforcement and judicial system can't perform their job appropriately. That's necessary to protect an image of fairness in the process. You know, Miranda rights and all that jazz. All of that said, I don't have THAT much heartburn that Avery is in prison - he doesn't seem like a great dude - but I am upset that there weren't more repercussions against his opposition.

Most of all, I am VERY upset about the handling, verdict, and any other facets of the nephews case. Absolutely unbelievable that he was put in jail and is still in jail. That is a perfect example of the system being broken.

Star wrote:

Brandon confessed to murder and then asked if he would be done soon so he could go back to school.

He had no concept of what was going on.

"And he volunteered a whole bunch of incredible detail that was not spoon-fed to him by someone else."

That detail included things that just couldn't have happened because there would have been blood all over the place, impossible to clean up.

This is like getting a confession from a parrot that can produce words but doesn't know what it is saying.

Do you think Brandon did the things he said he did but later recanted?

It is incorrect to claim he didn't know what he was saying. In recorded conversations with his mother he seemed quite lucid and in complete command of his thoughts. He may not be bright, but he knew what he was saying. Human behavior is a very complex thing. The comment about wanting to get back to school (he actually said he had a project or assignment that was due) could be interpreted as him not understanding the gravity of his own situation, or perhaps it was wishful thinking on his part motivated by a combination of fear and guilt. Or perhaps he was playing dumber than he actually is. Again, the kid on the phone with his mother does not sound like the same kid in the interrogation room. Why is that?

I completely understand the bias of the documentary and have already said Avery is more than likely guilty. What i do no understand and can not find anywhere is the blood evidence.

IF Halbach was stabbed in the house, there would be blood somewhere. There is no way they got it all (it has also been established that there is no evidence of her being tied up in the house. Bed posts would have had marks etc.. Also the chains/handcuffs found were proven NOT to have been used).

IF Halbach was shot in the garage there would have been blood somewhere ( a lot of somewheres actually). It would have been impossible to clean all of it with out disrupting the dust etc in the garage.

So She was not killed in the house or the garage which makes Dasseys confession false. It also makes the bullet w/ blood planted evidence.

I agree with you on the cop calling in plates - but why did he not say that on the stand? He had a total caught in lie look on face.

Lastly (for now) - The Calumet Police have got to suck - they found very little of the evidence used by prosecution. They had to get helped out by the city police. Fortunate they were there no?

The kid on the phone still sounded spaced out.

I'm asking you if you believe his words about the stabbing inside and where the blood went.

His words don't mean anything to me.

I'm not saying that I am sure that he was not involved.

I think he probably wasn't, though.

But his ability to comprehend and corroborate any story is seriously lacking.

He just looked like he would say anything to get out of that interrogation room.

Maybe he was involved in burning the body.

Maybe he actually saw Steven do something.

But the description he gave in the confession didn't happen.

I think his confession is useless in determining anything.

I think the biggest thing people have not been talking about, although I saw Rojo mention it:

THE FRICKIN $36 MIL THESE DUDES WERE ABOUT TO HAVE TO DISH OUT!

We can talk about conspiracy all we want. The truth is the Government is capable of doing whatever it wants. Fact. If they did not want to pay out this sum of money, they could do whatever they wanted at their disposal to not have to pay.

I mean come on, we all know Steve wasn't very smart. But I think you could line up 100 serial killers, and if they were about to walk into 30 some million, how many do you actually think would go kill someone in the next few days to mess that up?

That's the biggest motive right there for me... Government and money. It rules this country, it rules this world (outside of religion).

innocent#123 wrote:

I think the biggest thing people have not been talking about, although I saw Rojo mention it:

THE FRICKIN $36 MIL THESE DUDES WERE ABOUT TO HAVE TO DISH OUT!

We can talk about conspiracy all we want. The truth is the Government is capable of doing whatever it wants. Fact. If they did not want to pay out this sum of money, they could do whatever they wanted at their disposal to not have to pay.

I mean come on, we all know Steve wasn't very smart. But I think you could line up 100 serial killers, and if they were about to walk into 30 some million, how many do you actually think would go kill someone in the next few days to mess that up?

That's the biggest motive right there for me... Government and money. It rules this country, it rules this world (outside of religion).

Murder is never a reasonable decision made after carefully considering the risks and rewards.

The problem with that argument is that Theresa Halbech was murdered by someone, if not Avery. So, if the frame up was to invalidate or minimize the civil award, man the county got lucky that Halbech was murdered by someone right after she visited Avery's property. What are the chances?? Wow, what awesome luck for the county. She visits the property a few days after a series of depositions in the civil case and suddenly gets murdered, and then the county cover up/conspiracy machine springs into action and engineers a massive frame up, because framing Avery was way more important than finding the real deranged killer who would still be out and about in the community.

Or, even better, the County assassinated a completely innocent woman so they could frame Avery. And everyone is involved, even people not subject to injury by the civil suit.

Dude, don't you have to take over a National park restroom in Oregon or something?

Occam's razor, man. The simplest explanation with the fewest assumptions is usually the right one. Avery being the killer is the simplest explanation.

freedom - agree with your last point. I do not believe cops killed her. Though it would only take 1 to be on it, and then they all set things up to fit their narrative.

fwiw, a man that was convicted of taking a hatchet to his wife and is currently serving for attempted murder (crime committed on Nov 5 - day they found car), was confirmed to be on the Avery lot on Oct 31st.

A no time was this man questioned.

I have no issue with Avery behind bars. He belongs there for all the other things he has done (plus he prob is guilty of this too).

I do have a problem with a lot of the evidence does not back up the facts and those issues are not addressed reasonable - IE reasonable doubt.

I think some of you have watched too many dirty cop shows. Here's some things you can definitely rule out:

1. The cops didn't kill the woman.

2. The cops didn't plant the car.

3. The cops didn't plant the bones/purse contents.

4. The cops didn't plant the blood evidence in the car.

5. The cops didn't plant the bullet.

6. The cops didn't plant the DNA on the bullet.

Some things that cops could do:

1. Plant the car key.

2. Coerce a false confession out of Bobby Dassey.

The documentary, to me, isn't about the prosecution of Steven Avery in the murder of Teresa Halbach. It's a three case arc that starts with a bad conviction when an LEO worked too hard on a witness, and ends with a bad conviction because an LEO worked too hard on a defendant. The middle case is just a sideshow of a real murderer being rightly convicted of his crimes.