‘Making a Murderer’ nephew may be freed

A US judge has overturned the conviction of a Wisconsin man found guilty of helping his uncle kill a woman, in a case profiled in the Netflix television series

Brendan Dassey, 26, had been sentenced to 41 years in prison on charges of firstdegree intentional homicide, second-degree sexual assault and mutilation of a corpse. His uncle, Steven Avery, was also jailed for the murder of Teresa Halbach in October 2005.

The story of Avery, who was wrongly imprisoned for 18 years on rape charges before being found guilty of Halbach’s murder, and his nephew was told in a 10-part Netflix documentary series.

The series covered the controversy of both arrests and subsequent convictions in the Wisconsin city of Manitowoc. According to

the police coerced confessions out of Dassey and planted evidence to arrest Avery.

Dassey was shown in the series as a quiet young man with special needs, who confessed to the crime but then appeared unaware of what he had confessed to. In one scene, his mother asks him why he confessed to something he did not do, and Dassey simply looks confused.

On Friday, Judge William Duffin ruled that the guilty verdict returned by a trial jury in 2007 against Dassey was based on a coerced confession he gave as a 16-yearold youth with a learning disability. Unless the state decides to retrial him, Dassey – currently held in Columbia Correctional Institution – will be free in 90 days.

Avery’s lawyer, Kathleen Zellner, is preparing an appeal on his behalf, due to be filed on Aug 29. “I’m 1,000 per cent confident that I’ll be free,” Avery, now 54, told

magazine in a telephone interview this week.