The case of Steven Avery has become widely known thanks to the Netflix documentary show called Making a Murderer. Avery was accused of sexual assault and attempted murderer in 1985 and served eighteen years in prison. He was exonerated later by evidence of DNA tests, but only two years after his release, he was charged with murder. This essay will list the currently known arguments for the case and describe the case’s importance.
The general audience was brought to awareness about the case through the critically acclaimed Netflix show Making a Murderer. The history of cases brought to the public’s attention through documentaries, television mini-series, and reporters’ investigations show that the subjects are usually freed from prison after their innocence is brought to the general public. However, that rule does not apply to a documentary made on Avery’s case.
The documentary is the main source for the general public to gain insight into the evidence for Avery’s innocence in the cases. First, Avery was wrongly accused of brutally attacking a woman in a Wisconsin State Park. The woman picked Avery as an assailant in the photo array and the live lineup as she was conscious in the moment of the attack and remembered the face of the man that attacked her. However, the DNA test conducted eighteen years later showed that Avery’s case was one of the sad statistics where the victim is mistaken, and the individual is wrongly convicted. The real criminal confessed to his crime a few years later, but Avery was not aware of the confession and had to stay in prison for another eight years.
Further murder accusation that Avery was faced with two years after his release from prison and the collected evidence provided in the documentary shows that he was possibly framed by the police. New accusations featured evidence showing that the police department and its members might have manipulated the case (Schulz). One of the members could reportedly plant Avery’s blood in the victim’s vehicle, and another one suspiciously found the keys to the victim’s car in Avery’s home.
Avery’s case gained a significant amount of attention from the media and publicity. The case opens the public’s eyes to the ongoing issues in the criminal justice system and vindictive prosecutions. Avery’s example proves that there are many cases throughout the criminal justice system where the subject could be convicted due to the victim’s mistake or false confessions.
Work Cited
Schulz, Kathryn. “Dead Certainty: How “Making a Murderer” Goes Wrong” The New Yorker, 2016, Web.