The article focuses too much on Avery's actual guilt or innocence, in my opinion. It's possible he murdered her. It's possible he didn't.<p>But what the documentary really showed me was how utterly corrupt, venal, incompetent and evil the entire system of justice can be, from the 'court appointed lawyers' all the way up to the sheriffs that clearly, unequivocally framed Avery.<p>And it's fundamental to the principles of the legal system that the police and the prosecution must not be permitted to do that; and that we, as a society, must find some way to make that impossible and to punish those who violate the trust. Even if one, or ten, or a hundred believed-murderers go free.
Interesting article, but my opinion after seeing the documentary is that there is enough reasonable doubt to declare Avery not guilty. Maybe he did do it, but with all of the bullshit that happened during the investigation (the car key in plain sight, the cop calling in the license plate days before the car was officially found, the evidence tape cut on the blood vial, absence of blood in the bedroom despite the bloody and vicious confession from the nephew) the whole thing is beyond ridiculous.
The article equates prosecutorial misconduct to force a guilty sentence with editorial choices in a documentary. Because both show "bias". In the one case it's utterly illegal and it undermines the moral validity of the justice system and in the other case we're talking about a simple exercise of free speech, but apparently this distinction isn't meaningful in the eyes of the author.<p>The quote in question: "The point of being scrupulous about your means is to help insure accurate ends, whether you are trying to convict a man or exonerate him. Ricciardi and Demos instead stack the deck to support their case for Avery, and, as a result, wind up mirroring the entity that they are trying to discredit."<p>This equivocation is morally repugnant.<p>The article also gets their facts wrong. They claim: "Investigators subsequently found DNA from Avery’s perspiration on the hood latch—evidence that would be nearly impossible to plant.". This is a fabrication. There is no distinction between blood DNA, sweat DNA, skin DNA. DNA was found under the hood latch, but no blood was seen. Hence a logical conjecture is that the source is perspiration, but it could have been any other source. As for it being hard to plant, that's laughable. Simply swipe a t-shirt or dirty sock on any surface and it will leave DNA behind. None of Avery's finger prints were found on the car, and finger prints ARE hard to plant. In contrast to DNA, which IS trivial to plant if you have access to somebody's apartment.<p>The charge that the documentary is bad because doesn't display a clear timeline of the events doesn't make sense, because it's the responsibility of the prosecution to explain what happened, and they didn't have a single narrative that was consistent with all the evidence. Which is why the prosecution's story of what happened was completely different in Avery's and Dassy's trials.<p>Juries don't believe police officers would ever lie during testimony. They believe the police are the good guys who just want to catch the bad guys. The public has to let go of this naive view of the world, and look at all evidence presented during a trial with healthy skepticism. The 'Making a Murderer' documentary teaches people to be skeptical about claims by the police, which is a great public service.<p>The article closes by reiterating the terrible equivocation they made earlier. That exposing prosecutorial misconduct is somehow only permissible in a completely unopinionated format. The New Yorker should be ashamed for publishing this trash.
I agree with other comment here where I don't know if Avery is guilty or not. However, the documentary absolutely showed how corrupt and evil the entire justice system can be and how one is at severe disadvantage if they are uneducated and poor.<p>For me, personally, the ultimate proof of injustice is how Ken proposed two different theories in two trials. For Avery, murder was committed in garage. For Brendan, murder was committed in the bedroom. I have learned that as per the letter of the law, it is legal. However, by doing this, Ken Kratz has confirmed that all he cares about is prosecution and he is not out seeking truth/justice.
What's really scary to me is that very, very few defendants actually go to trial in the US. For a variety of troubling reasons[1], most defendants take a plea bargain.<p>I would guess the risks associated with planting evidence and other misconduct by police is pretty low when you use it to coerce a plea. There's not any sort of venue to expose it.<p>[1]<a href="http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2014/11/20/why-innocent-people-plead-guilty/" rel="nofollow">http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2014/11/20/why-innocent-peop...</a>
1. In the American system, we <i>are</i> biased for innocence, so there's nothing wrong with the documentarians for operating on that assumption.<p>2. The documentarians omit, while the police fabricate. The documentarians are not mirroring the entity they set out to indict.<p>3. 3 to 4 days is not a terribly long time for a jury to deliberate on a case like this.
What's the <i>real</i> story behind the following:<p>The short haired sheriff who called in Theresa's licence plate + Make/Model two days before it was discovered...<p>+<p>The licence plates were discovered separately hidden from the car
What a load of drivel.<p>There is a set of writers who will always (always) take the contrarian view, just to drive clicks.<p>She spends the first 4 paragraphs talking about Perry Mason. And then just a couple, talking about Avery.<p>Here's the problem with the case, as I saw it (I watched the entire 10 episodes over a week). The only physical evidence tying Avery to the murder was collected by the pair of detectives who least of everyone else were supposed to be there. How convenient!<p>Secondly, to the evidence itself: if Avery did all the throat-slashing and raping, where is the evidence?? Surely they should find <i>ONE</i> speck of blood, or hair or skin cells or something??? Avery is such a genius that he can wipe all evidence of this massacre from a carpeted, cluttered bedroom (so badly cluttered that they couldn't find the key, sitting in plain sight, in 4 previous tries!), while leaving his own DNA around everywhere?? Same for the garage, where apparently she was shot: no blood, nothing. But there was blood from various deer carcasses of the past!<p>And don't even get me started on the key! His DNA is on it ... but not hers, even though she drove it?!? And why is it the valet key? And how come the two suspect detectives immediately recognized it was the "right" key, even though they were in a f'in junkyard with a 1000 vehicles around?<p>And his blood in the vehicle: even if you accept that it's his blood, where are the fingerprints?? Oh right: when it came to fingerprints, he was wearing a glove. Which, conveniently once again, allowed the blood to seep through in the right places.<p>The author uses Brendan's statement that he helped his uncle put the body in the RAV4, hence the "sweat DNA", <i>AFTER</i> admitting that the confession was fake! Anyone who has watched the "confession" would be left with boiling rage at the interrogators.<p>And she doesn't mention Len Kachinsky, the public "defender" who effectively railroaded Brendan?<p>I could go on and on, but this article is pure drivel.
I think the real underlying problem here isn't film makers misleading people (which i agree is very annoying) its people believing what they see on tv and then acting on it (which is more annoying).<p>So if you find yourself typing up a nasty email to a sheriff or whoever bc of something you saw on a tv show...please realize you are being a moron and stop typing...save as draft. Then, if you're willing to invest the time, do some real research and if you are still convinced your outrage is justified...by all means carry on with the nasty email.<p>This way film makers can make their money, people can be entertained and/or inspired to better things, and nobody gets assaulted by an angry mob of stupid people.
>But neither “Serial” (which is otherwise notable for its thoroughness) nor “Making a Murderer” ever addresses the question of what rights and considerations should be extended to victims of violent crime, and under what circumstances those might justifiably be suspended. Instead, both creators and viewers tacitly dismiss the pain caused by such shows as collateral damage, unfortunate but unavoidable. Here, too, the end is taken to justify the means; someone else’s anguish comes to seem like a trifling price to pay for the greater cause a documentary claims to serve.<p>Aww come the hell on! The public has a very strong interest in monitoring the criminal justice system. We cannot do that without knowledge of the crimes and the victims. Yes, it sucks for them. Crime is bad. But the public cannot hope to establish and direct a justice system capable of deterring crime without learning facts about actual prosecutions, which unfortunately includes information about the victim and what was done to them.<p>Besides, the vast majority (possibly all, IIRC) of the footage of Hallbach's family consisted of public interviews of her brother. You can't repeatedly and voluntarily thrust yourself into the media spotlight and then cry foul when people use that footage.<p>What serious journalist really thinks this is a reasonable argument to make? Are we supposed to turn a blind eye to police corruption and inadequate due process because it makes one person and their family uncomfortable?
Throughout this whole article all I could think of is how was Erle Stanley Gardner writing in a magazine that ran from 1882 to 1891. when he was born in 1889. He was a very advanced toddler I suppose.
felixgallo - this is the point I've been making to all my friends and family - the no 1. point of the documentary was to shine a light on the broken system itself... the fact that everyone is talking about the case shows that ppl really don't care or don't get it...
One point that is glossed over, and that destroys the whole foundation of the article: the filmmakers started filming the doc 12 years ago when he was acquitted after the DNA test. They just naturally followed him around, and happened to be at the right place at the right time when the murder charges came along.<p>So no, the makers did not just wake up one day after the conviction and tried to make him innocent. They were there the whole time.