Netflix show Making a Murderer - Steven Avery case, etc

honestly my anger peaked early at that police video w/ officers snickering at Steven's invite to an Innocence Project event. dirty fuckers.

think I need more enlightenment on the unsealed Styrofoam container and hole-poked in the blood sample testtube -- some reddit thread said the hole in the stopper was not that bizarre for some justifiable reason idk

Actually I've sort of been craving one of those articles that debunks the presented narrative; says what the doc missed out, etc. etc. I truly think no amount of filmmaker manipulation could make me think those guys are anything but 100% innocent, but I'm always fascinated by that angle - I remember falling down an insane anti-West Memphis 3 rabbit hole online once, and I learned a ton more there... (but still knew those guys were innocent too)...

i can't decide if i think steven is innocent but the kid had nothing to do with it at all. the police interrogations are appalling. he may have been incompetent to stand trial, i wonder if the new lawyers (after kuchinsky was discharged) explored that.

brendans mom did say he had stains on his jeans when he came home that I think she washed off iirc? idk obv if anything happened it was nothing like the DAs story but im not 100 % he didn't see something or do something as an unwitting accessory

my gf feel asleep during bredan's cross examination. the next day i tried to skip over it but she was like 'no i missed brendan on the stand i want to see it'. it was not easier to watch a second time. steven's mother also had me tearing up several times throughout

also that mustache crying about the 'blue ribbon' made me very angry.

i can't decide if i think steven is innocent

I'd be curious to hear your take on what might have gone down.

(The fact that the defense had to stick with one theory meant so many roads weren't nearly explored enough for me - namely the ex-boyfriend (who kept calling himself a 'friend') who had been deleting text messages, but certainly other possible figures of interest as well...)

I'm excited to watch this, even though I suspect I'm not going to be happy about how my hometown is portrayed. I remember all this so well, it was on the news daily, seemed like an open and shut case in the beginning but it got stranger and stranger as it went on. Full disclosure, I knew several of the Avery's, I'm guessing their reputation is well discussed in the doc. when it came to Dassey most of us thought it would be a travesty if he got significant time, the guy was so clearly being manipulated and had no clue what was going on.

Wow, I'd love to hear your take after you've seen it. I have tons of family in Northern Illinois/Southern Wisconsin; I don't think the area is portrayed badly by the film at all - it's really about corrupt authority everywhere. The Averys certainly come across as loyal, caring people who have just been damned from birth and treated like shit from the get-go, with every mistake held against them a million times over throughout their lives.

Yeah there are a lot of short interviews with locals and they mostly seem like a pretty savvy bunch

namely the ex-boyfriend (who kept calling himself a 'friend') who had been deleting text messages

Voicemails, iirc?

this is mean but i was wondering if steven's parents were closely related. they look like brother and sister. i thought of that before mustache's email then i felt bad for it.

i don't know what i think might have happened if steven did do it. i just couldn't think of another theory that makes sense to me. i also think it's possible he did it and the police did things to make the case against him stronger, such as the blood and the key.

Brendan was def over that night in some capacity imo. in transcripts of one of his interrogations he mentions knowing abt steven needing to be alert to receive one of the calls from Jodi

of course that could be completely innocent and them just sitting outside around the bonfire and steven saying I need to go in the house for this call etc

the police interrogations are appalling. he may have been incompetent to stand trial,

i've only watched the first 3 episodes but ... Brendan comes across as being "mentally disabled" and like he's totally incompetent legally

They are pitching this in the trailer as a sort of mystery—WHERE WILL YOU STAND?—but unlike The Staircase (an equally compelling/addictive serial crime doc) is there ever really any doubt about the subject's innocence?

SPOILER-iSH:

Two hugely frustrating aspects: 1) Brendan's failure on the witness stand to come out say he felt coerced in his testimony; and 2) unless I missed it, his attorneys' failure to screen the video evincing as much. ARRGHH. I only hope the filmmakers left this part out to amp viewer indignation?

It would be easy to chalk 1) up to Brendan's incapability on the stand, but with that exception he was actually great! When he answered "I believe it's called Kiss the Girls," I had this glimmer of hope that he had just knocked it out of the park and we were in for a comeback. But christ this thing is devastating. I kinda don't have it in me to watch the last ep.

i got the book on this from my lib today, gonna binge read

SPOILER-iSH:

Two hugely frustrating aspects: 1) Brendan's failure on the witness stand to come out say he felt coerced in his testimony; and 2) unless I missed it, his attorneys' failure to screen the video evincing as much. ARRGHH. I only hope the filmmakers left this part out to amp viewer indignation?

It would be easy to chalk 1) up to Brendan's incapability on the stand, but with that exception he was actually great! When he answered "I believe it's called Kiss the Girls," I had this glimmer of hope that he had just knocked it out of the park and we were in for a comeback. But christ this thing is devastating. I kinda don't have it in me to watch the last ep.

Yeah I was holding my breathe while he was on the stand. I thought he was so good especially considering the prosecution were doing anything they could to make him slip up. I don't know that it would have helped for Brendan to say he was coerced. I feel like that was really his counsel's job and 3 diff lawyers failed on that 3 times. I guess its hard to have an already biased jury buy the 'Well i told the truth and they called me a liar so I told a lie and that's the truth' line. What really frustrated me is that they chose to focus on disproving the false confession and not focus on the fact that the story is impossible with zero dna evidence in the trailer or on Teresa.

Totally I was screaming at the TV they should've been hammering away at how it is even remotely possible that Therea was butchered, stabbed, and shot but ZERO of her blood or DNA (or his!) was found. Maddening.

Also Kratts (?) presuming to connect dots like a) Auto Trader magazine in Steven house, therefore b) victim was also in house. Fuckface.

haha yeah. that theory must implicate every mechanic, body shop worker and 16 year old kid in town.

Also, I don't get why guilt vs innocence was so strongly played in both of these cases. i mean you don't have to be innocent. you just have to not be guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Innocence seems a lot to shoot for in both of these situations (innocent as either party may have been).

there are different theories to it among trial lawyers. one of the biggest theories is you have to sell a narrative of innocence because not all jurors can grasp the concept of reasonable doubt and the burden of proof and it is less of an uphill battle if you can tell dumb (and even not dumb) people a story of how your client is innocent.

i was not sure what was left out of brandon's trial by the filmmakers. his testimony could have been a lot stronger but his inability to testify well to help himself could be an artifact of his cognitive limitations too.

it made me wonder how "cognitively limited" does one have to be to get declared incompetent? just watching and listening to his interviews with the detectives, the investigator, his mom ... he seemed to have the mental capacity of a child

short answer ime is the bar is very low and he probably would be found competent i just wondered if it was even tried

just a few episodes in

when the fiancee gets out of jail and comes home to find things all dumped on the floor in her home -- is that really how the police left it, or was someone in there because it was never really secure and anyone could wander in?

you would think they'd have an interest when no one was living there to at least keep things arranged in some way, since they might have to get a warrant yet again?

and what the hell is with people repeatedly referring to Avery as "cold-blooded?" he did some stupid shit when he was really young, but was thrown in jail for something he didn't do at age 23. was he really violent in prison? was there some incident of him being aggressive to reporters when he got out?

there's this repeated "i've got a bad feeling about him" vibe when the show really only shows that members of this family are kind of uneducated or not completely competent, lower class, and get into legal trouble that a lot of people do -- but do more repeatedly when they don't really have resources to dig out of it

this interrogation tape with Brendan is heartbreaking, it's people prodding a kid to say anything incriminating

oh god the kid's attorney saying it's common for kids to be questioned without their parents or representation there

fuck this guy

Yeah that narrative re: Steven's past is maddening—esp. the notion that "his crimes keep getting worse," "at this rate who knows what he's capable of" etc.

he did set the family cat on fire, which is something that sociopaths/psychopaths tend to do, apparently

the narrative is that they were being dumb and throwing it around, including over the fire?

i'm #1 cat lover over here but stupid kids and small animals are not a good combination

he wasn't a kid ... he was a young adult i think?

he was around 20 and with an IQ of 70? idk

though apparently the nephew also had an IQ of 70, and compared to him Steven seemed smart

I think "IQ of 70" is, with IQ being kind of a bullshit measurement, shorthand for "baseline legally competent"

this series is one of the most upsetting things i've ever seen

i wish that the filmmakers had gone outside the scope of the trial to offer up some theories on what might have happened to teresa but i understand why for various legal reasons they (and/or the lawyers) might have chose not to. because of that it's hard to understand what even might have happened to her and at whose hands, but i find it pretty hard to imagine that steven was involved. the case they built against him was nonsensical and he never altered his story, plus i just don't understand what his motive would have been. him killing her just makes no sense to me and weirdly the prosecution didn't seem to need or want to offer a motive, which seems unusual to me.

im just talking out of my ass here but clearly brendan wasn't involved in the killing. that said i do feel like he saw something that fucked him up (the whole part about him isolating himself and losing weight) which makes me think someone else in the family might have done it

the one thing i can't quite figure out in my mind is, depending on who might have done it, at which point the cops decide that they are gonna try and pin it on steve

somehow i feel like brendan's first attorney's investigator (the focus of the final episode) might be the most evil person in the entire thing

I'm guessing, if the whole framing thing is true, sometime between the last deposition in the civil suit and the day of the murder.
If the framing isn't true then they ran into some incredible luck with the murderer dumping the car in Avery's yard. Xpost.

I'm guessing, if the whole framing thing is true, sometime between the last deposition in the civil suit and the day of the murder.

meaning the cops orchestrated her murder? for some reason i want to give them the benefit of the doubt that they didn't do that thought it's not like they deserve it

if she died for some other reason, i'm curious as to when they plausibly could have figured out they might be able to put it on steve and then what they needed to facilitate to make that happen (i.e. was the car already there or did they move it? were the bone fragments there or did they place them? etc)

I would not put it past them. That comment the sherriff (?) made about how "it would have been easier to kill him" is chilling. When you think about what was at stake for these guys—careers, reputations, civil suits that would surely bankrupt them personally—plus the 36 million from the county, and add in the general sense they seem to have had that the Avery's were subhuman trash (the investigator's incest rant) I don't think it's much of a stretch that they would do it.

somehow i feel like brendan's first attorney's investigator (the focus of the final episode) might be the most evil person in the entire thing

Yeah this creep with his constant nervous smile. The investigator and prosecutors and cops, at least they were evil in the course of their actual jobs. I wonder if this guy gets any sleep at night.

It's also saddening how in the immediate aftermath of the Steven verdict, Strang and Buting—disingenuously, to my eyes—felt they needed to soften if not entirely walk back their contention that he was framed. These are a couple of righteous guys and even they understand that if they ever want a decision ruled in their favor again, they're expected to chalk the conviction up to a vaguely "broken system." I had the sense during that conference-table reunion a few years later that these men were broken, depleted...not because they lost the case (which is part of the job) or even because they know the county got away w/ basically abetting a murder, but because they personally ran up against the same hard ceiling their client did—fuck with the police at your own peril.

I haven't made it through the last few but Brendan's first attorney, and his investigator, made me so angry I had to walk away from watching for a day. His consolation prize for coming in third for a DA election in middle-of-nowhere Wisconsin is the publicity of not even attempting to defend a client? fuck that guy

the thing that really riled me throughout was the da and his cohort talking about what a disgrace it was that the defence was accusing police officers of wrongdoing. like as if just by dint of being in the police, someone is a paragon of virtue. they seemed to keep reinforcing that point, as if a great police force is by necessity built on a refusal to even consider the fact that it could be corrupt - i mean obv corruption is guaranteed where you have public figures with power...

i've seen the staircase/paradise lost etc but the cops in this really came across far worse.

hmmm watched one hour of this stuff and can't imagine watching 9 more hours of it. not that i need 'suspense' to string me along but it felt like such an overview that i don't even know how to get motivated to watch any more of it.

well the first ep kinda is an overview of a huge period of time - the actual story develops after that...

hmmm watched one hour of this stuff and can't imagine watching 9 more hours of it. not that i need 'suspense' to string me along but it felt like such an overview that i don't even know how to get motivated to watch any more of it.

― i got a really big steen, and they need some really big zings (some dude), Saturday, December 26, 2015 7:01 AM (10 hours ago) Bookmark

breh you're out here watching every minute of the new rob lowe show you can find the time

yeah, the rest of the season isn't about reiterating the first episode. It's not even that much about what happens in the first episode.

the show's called "making a murderer" and there's not even any murder in the first episode ..................................

did not realize steven is only like 5ft 3inches tall

That's the same height as my dad. I wonder if he is guilty.

Also Muggsy Bogues.

Just watched most of this again, this time with my Dad (we got the idea due to the Manitowoc County PD getting another bizarre online shooting threat over this). He works for them so it's kinda funny to see him point out all the guys he knows - "this guy was in our house last month!" - not to mention little glimpses in the courtroom of people I went to school with. Much more surreal the second time around, plus I feel I'm not as biased anymore since who the hell knows. At this point I'm convinced there are multiple parties hiding something here, whether he's guilty or not there is no single narrative that seems to fit what we know. If he killed her it almost certainly didn't happen the way the prosecution claims it did, if he didn't then they caught a crazy number of lucky breaks along the way. Nothing makes logical sense unless there were multiple parties doing not-very-well-thought-out things at the same time during the search of the Avery property.

Netflix has commissioned a follow-up to this. Can't imagine there's enough to sustain a whole new miniseries but I guess we'll see.

yeah it's kind of strange because outside of the release of the documentary itself effectively nothing has happened in the case. like what's to be gleaned from this besides "yep they're still in jail"...hard to believe there's some smoking gun here we don't know about

A federal judge has ordered Brendan Dassey released: http://nordic.businessinsider.com/making-a-murderer-brendan-dassey-conviction-overturned-2016-8?r=US&IR=T

Just watched this. The ex-boyfriend looked suspicious to me

Ikr?

Has there ever been an instance where a DA declined to prosecute a defendant, despite having a winning case, because she felt strongly that the defendant was indeed innocent? Wouldn't that be heartening.

(And I don't nec mean oh yeah the ex did the murder, just that he looked a little bit too in control, a bit calculated, then the business with the phone messages etc)

Dassey to be released this Friday!

That's awesome. So I'm not terribly well-versed in these things but...since Avery's conviction hinged to such a great extent on Dassey's testimony, would Dassey's release be enough to get Avery a retrial?

since he didn't testify at the trial, I would think, maybe not?

Didn't the prosecution in the end choose not to involve Dassey in the Avery trial, probably because they realized Avery's great lawyers would tear it to pieces, then turn around and prosecute Dassey anyway?

Addicted to this, about a year after everyone else... Not read the thread obviously, but can't believe some of what I'm seeing.

there must be loads they're not showing, right? The prosecution keep mentioning Steven's 'real character' and his crimes ramping up, seems like it's referring to something not discussed/shown?

keep waiting for the twist - or some answers - but feeling quite depressed that there doesn't seem to be any coming.

ok seen it all now going to read this thread and google everything I can. Parked next to a RAV4 this morning and freaked myself out a bit when I clocked it.

somehow i feel like brendan's first attorney's investigator (the focus of the final episode) might be the most evil person in the entire thing

YES I said this EXACT thing.
I also said that mild-mannered Kratz looked exactly like the person who'd get up to some nasty shit in his private life, and like 5 minutes later the texting stuff happened

This has been bothering me: in the closing arguments of Steven's case, the prosecution says to the jury that if you say he's not guilty then you're saying the Sheriff's dept are guilty of the serious set-up crimes etc. Surely that's not the case? Been a while since I did jury duty (UK) but the judge was very clear when instructing the jury that all you need is to have reasonable doubt, not be beyond reasonable doubt that an alternative chain of events happened. That's not what's on trial, and imo a judge would not be able to instruct that or have someone suggest that's how verdicts work?

Looks like Brendan didn't get out: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/17/brendan-dassey-making-a-murderer-release-blocked-appeals-court

Wasn't sure where to post this, but this thread seemed like the best for people who are interested in true crime stuff on Netflix. The post below was from a year ago on the law &order svu thread. The documentary is coming to Netflix on May 19.

http://people.com/crime/sister-cathy-cesnik-murder-netflix-documentary/

A member of my family is a survivor of sexual abuse by a priest in Baltimore in the late 60s/early 70s. She's gone through a lot, met with other survivors, and become an activist. I'm pretty impressed by how far she's come. Last fall I got to attend a meeting with her and the other survivors while they were being interviewed for a documentary. I'm not sure of the status of that project, but I just found out that last week's SVU was loosely based on the case. She's a longtime L&O fan and while I haven't asked her about it directly, I hear she's very stoked.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/14/cesnik-nun-murder-maskell_n_7267532.html

http://www.nbc.com/law-and-order-special-victims-unit/video/unholiest-alliance/2998226

― how's life, Monday, March 28, 2016 2:35 PM (one year ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Khr7dbuBjuE

Awesome!

Yeah, we're excited that the story is getting out there these days, because a couple of decades ago I remember the general response to this was "these women are just making this up to get money out of the catholic church." I'm sure some people will still feel that way, but in the past few years there's been a real community that's developed among the women who attended this high school and/or suffered the abuse.

That said, I'm kinda anxious about how much attention it's going to get and what kind of nuts are going to come out of the woodwork about this.

If you get a chance listen to the CASEFILE podcast episode 'The Catholic Mafia'. No one dies but its pretty shocking.

Oh shit! Will check it out for sure.

man fuck your shitty corrupt country

but first make zellner president

tbh the whole series was utterly frustrating (if compelling) - here's yet another brilliant refutation of the case! oh wait it doesn't matter though because you are fighting an enemy that will not let you win

i could listen to taped phone calls of steve & his mom all day, something abt their exchanging like single words or fragments of phrases i really love and id w/ on some level idk

zellner is v good

bobby dasseys search history is a trip - http://www.stevenaverycase.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Exhibits-Part-1-of-2.pdf

https://nypost.com/2019/09/23/wisconsin-inmate-confesses-to-infamous-making-a-murderer-slay-report/

so there's a new documentary-style show in post-production that seems to take the prosecution's side? if the confession by someone completely unrelated pans out, they're going to look... not good

is it supposed to be taking their side? Or merely focuing on them?

the title seems to imply a conclusion

"sadly, the inmate who confessed to the murder later flung himself down six flights of stairs and died"

this song will singlehandedly get Dassey out of prison

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lRlXzoIZ0hk

classic for "everyone loves my brother like they love bbq ribs".