Brendan Dassey’s Conviction From ‘Making a Murderer’ Was Just Overturned
A federal judge in Milwaukee has just overturned Brendan Dassey’s guilty conviction for the 2005 murder of Teresa Halbach. His trial was documented on the Netflix show “Making a Murderer”Β that we all binge-watched this past winter.
In the documentary, it was shown that Brendan’s confession to the killing of Teresa was basically coerced by his lawyers and prosecutors. He was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole, and it turns out that the judge felt that was enough evidence to prove Brendan’s innocence.
Judge William Duffin, who overturned the ruling, said in a report that “misconduct” by Brendan’s court-appointed lawyer, Len Kachinsky, was “indefensible” because of how old Brendan was and the fact that he was a slow learner. Len made promises to Brendan to get him to talk.
Brendan, who is now 26, will be released from prison within 90 days. That is unless another trial is scheduled,Β according to the statement from the judge.
Steven Avery, who was also convicted for the murder of Teresa Halbach, has hired an entire new team of lawyers, including Kathleen Zellner who told WISN today that she is happy about the ruling.
“We fully expected this outcome from an unbiased court that carefully examined his confession. I was just visiting Steven Avery, and he is so happy for Brendan. We know when an unbiased court reviews all of the new evidence we have, Steven will have his conviction overturned as well,”Β Kathleen says.
The creators of the wildly popular documentary “Making a Murderer” are working on producing season 2 of the show, still following Brendan and Steven as they attempt to prove their innocence.
