Making A Murderer

Glad @JackReacher started this thread. It got minor play in the TV Thread on the Anything Goes board but mostly with dismissive comments by non-viewers familiar with the case from the Kratz-friendly media perspective.

 

We watched this over the last 3 days and were completely caught up. I think there's reasonable doubt for Avery perhaps but the nephew's story just broke my heart. Dean Strang and Jerome Buting were the two people that really got to me. They seemed so committed, decent and honorable and genuinely upset at what they saw as a broken justice system that I couldn't help but be genuinely moved.

 

12 Burning Questions About "Making A Murderer" Answered

 

Finished it last night. A few more thoughts:

I think Dassey's court appointed lawyers - the two at trial, not the earlier idiot - did a pretty good job with the shit sandwich that was handed to them. To me, though, the contrast in his and his uncle's cases highlights the disparity in representation for people with money and those that don't.

Avery was able to use his settlement money to pay for a defense, which allowed his lawyers to hire expert witnesses and use their own investigator to poke significant holes in the state's case. I think an expert witness on interrogation techniques could have made a significant difference in Dassey's case.

The lack of forensic evidence in places it should be is absolutely stunning. Forensic evidence isn't the end-all, be-all that we want it to be, but if this case happened anywhere near the state's theory, there should've been some in the trailer or the garage.

Avery's consistent innocence claim is one of the hallmarks of an actual innocence claim. Of course, he may have learned that while the Innocence Project worked on his earlier case.

 

Two more: that press conference that Ken Kratz gave after Dassey's confession is stunning to me. That's the same kind of crap that got Mike Nifong disbarred in the Duke lacrosse case. The press conference was incredibly prejudicial to both defendants.

And on a similar note: Why the hell didn't the judge clamp down on all the extrajudicial statements that the police, district attorney and defense attorneys were making?

 

We just finished episode 8.

The defense lawyers were much more likable than the cops or prosecutors.

The prosecutor seemed like a real creep, and apparently he is:

Mr Kratz, who resigned as District Attorney in 2010 after sexting a domestic abuse victim in a scandal that saw his legal licence suspended for four months, accused filmmakers for not wanting to “muddy up a perfectly good conspiracy movie with what actually happened”.

The key evidence 'left out' of Making a Murderer

I've got to read more about what might have been left out before coming to a final decision, but based on what I've seen, it does seem like evidence -- especially the key, and maybe the blood -- was planted.

Were they planting evidence so they could convince a guilty man? Maybe? But, where was she killed? Where's the blood.

And, the nephew is just a dumb kid. Like really dumb. Wants to know if he's going to get back to class in time to hand in his assignment. Is worried about missing Wrestlemania. The cops get him to agree to their story, but then so does his own investigator that's assigned the case. Holy shit.

And, without his evidence, which puts the murder in the trailer bedroom, there's no motive.

To me, it really comes down to her car. If that was somehow planted on their property, then I'm much more willing to believe he didn't do it.

 

I was more than a little surprised to see the nephew being escorted to his trial by Sergeant Andrew Colborn. Are there only 3 cops in that entire friggin' department??

 

We haven't gotten there yet.

The nephew would have obviously made a terrible witness, but the prosecution completely abandoned his "story" in Steven's trial, so I'm not sure why he was even still in jail at that point.

I almost feel like the defense should have called him as a witness.

 

Just finished watching the whole 10 episodes in 2 days.

It looks a lot like he was framed, from the doc although some of the evidence that wasn't included, which I learned of in this thread, makes it seem a little more plausible that he did it.

The big issue I had with the defense's theory is it requires there to be some third party out there who....

1. Had some motive to kill her and
2. Had enough knowledge of the system to know the cops would pin it on Avery and ...
3. Was lucky enough that the girl just happened to be going to have contact with Avery to set the scene for the setup.

If 1 isn't true and it was just someone who wanted to get Avery, why not just kill him? I suppose the answer is this way you get Avery and the cops don't look for you. But still, seems like a lot of coincidences.

Anyway, it was very well done but I was disappointed in the end (just like with Serial) that we didn't get the answers. I realize that's not the filmmakers fault.

 

Sadly for Ma and Pa Avery, the most likely alternate killer(s) are other Avery family members.

 

I think if 1 isn't true, the other possibility is that (and I think it's what the lawyers were arguing) is someone kills the woman and either dumps the car on or near the Avery property. The police get wind that Avery and contact with her and suspect him right away. Not wanting to lose him again because of DNA, they make sure the car has his blood in it and plant the key to the woman's car in his trailer. They suspect he did it didn't have enough evidence, so they made sure it was there.

Regardless of whether that is true or if Avery actually did kill her, the case was such a shit-show that there should have been enough reasonable doubt that he shouldn't have been convicted. I wish I knew more law to say why the conviction should be tossed on appeal, but I feel like it should. Of course, the lawyers have to argue that there were mistakes in the trial and I don't know what as a matter of law those mistakes were. If nothing else, I wish there was something to help his nephew. That kid got shat on by the system.

 

I finished it a week ago and came away thinking that Avery is probably guilty but Dassey is almost certainly not. That was the real story to me, how those investigators led this poor, dumb kid to the conclusion they wanted. And how his defense worked with Avery's prosecutors. It was sickening.

As for Avery, perhaps I'm being naive but I just can't give that yokel police department enough credit to believe they could put together such a complete framing job, especially after reading about the evidence that was left out. It would also require me to believe they were either involved in the murder or knew who the real murderer was and ignored that so they could frame Avery. And I just can't get there in my mind.

But I can mentally reach the possible scenario of Avery, who has a sketchy history of violence toward women and animals, being a little obessed with this photographer and going too far, thinking that the innocent hero who spent 18 years in prison unjustly couldn't be convicted again. I also think it is easy to believe the filmmakers pushed the framing narrative and ignoring other evidence because it is a more interesting story that way.

There's obviously some messed up shit with this investigation and case, but I tend to fall back on Occam's Razor. And the simplest explanation to me isn't a conspiracy to frame an innocent man.