Author Archives: Garry Rodgers

About Garry Rodgers

After three decades as a Royal Canadian Mounted Police homicide detective and British Columbia coroner, International Best Selling author and blogger Garry Rodgers has an expertise in death and the craft of writing on it. Now retired, he wants to provoke your thoughts about death and help authors give life to their words.

NETFLIX MAKING A MURDERER — BRENDAN DASSEY’S CONFESSION

Several years ago, Netflix released a highly popular series called Making a Murderer. It covered the case where Steven Avery and his nephew, 16-year-old Brendan Dassey, were convicted in the first-degree murder of Teresa Halbach that occurred in Manitowoc County, Wisconsin on October 31, 2005. Both were sentenced to life imprisonment—Avery with no possibility of parole and Dassey eligible to apply in 2048. While the evidence against Avery is strong, the facts supporting Dassey’s guilt hinge solely on his police confession to which there’s a high likelihood of being false and obtained under significant coercion with psychological manipulation.

I recently published a piece titled Netflix Making a Murderer. Did Police Really Frame Steven Avery? It covers the evidence that convicted Avery and concludes Avery was guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. I ended the post by saying I had severe doubts about the validity of Brendan Dassey’s confession.

For the past three weeks, I’ve closely looked at Brendan Dassey’s side of the Teresa Halbach murder file. This was a complex and time-consuming task as there’s a lot of material available, and that’s an understatement. At the heart of the issue is determining if Dassey truly was involved as a murder accomplice with Avery as he inconsistently claimed in his recorded confession. Or, the question also asks, “Did Brendan Dassey falsely confess and therefore was wrongly convicted?” which would be a horrific miscarriage of justice.

As I remarked, this is a highly complex subject that I’ve spent hours examining, and it’s impossible to cover all the details in a blog post. I’ve reached a conclusion, based on the balance of probabilities and from my personal experience with investigating homicides and obtaining murder confessions. First, let’s review the case facts, look at who Brendan Dassey is, and then discuss the issues in play that led to Dassey’s conviction.

If you haven’t already done so, it’s worthwhile to read the prequel post Netflix Making a Murderer. Did Police Really Frame Steven Avery?

Teresa Halbach was a 24-year-old photographer who attended Avery’s auto salvage business to photo a vehicle Avery wanted to list on Autotrader. She was reported missing two days later. On November 6, 2005, her incinerated body was found in a burn pile behind Avery’s shop. Other items belonging to Halbach were also located—her vehicle, camera, phone, and an ignition key found in Avery’s bedroom. Forensic evidence indisputably linked Avery to the crime, and a bullet also linked her shot body to Steven Avery’s rifle.

In February 2006, Brendan Dassey surfaced as an accomplice suspect. Following a chain of police interviews—interrogations if you like—Dassey made progressive statements where he went from knowing nothing to claiming to have raped Halbach, slit her throat, and helped Avery burn her body. He was convicted based on his statements alone, and there was absolutely no corroborating physical or other evidence to support that his confession was truthful Subsequently, Dassey’s conviction has been upheld, and his appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States has been denied. Dassey remains in jail under a strong probability of being completely innocent.

Brendan Dassey and His Legal Path

Brendan Ray Dassey was born on October 19, 1989, in Manitowoc County, Wisconsin to parents Barbara and Peter Dassey. He was raised along with four brothers in a mobile home located on the Avery property and, in the fall of 2005, attended Mishicot High School. Dassey struggled with education and communication. His IQ was rated at 65 which classified as cognitively disabled and borderline for mentally handicapped. Some of his classes were in the special education category, and he was failing at three of those.

Brendan Dassey was described as quiet and introverted with an interest in WWE wrestling, animals, and video games. He appeared slow to comprehend and slow to respond. This is clearly evident in his recorded police engagements. Before this case, Dassy had no contact with the criminal justice system and was not a troublemaker.

Dassey’s first police interview in the Halbach murder was on November 6, 2005. He was returning to the Avery property and riding in Steven Avery’s car driven by Dassey’s older brother. The police were onsite investigating Halbach’s disappearance, and they had a warrant to search that vehicle.

Brendan Dassey was isolated in the back of a police car and spoken to by officers who wanted to know if Dassey had seen Halbach on the property. Dassey stated he had not and had no information to offer that would assist in locating Halbach and determining what happened to her. This interview was audio recorded, but Dassey was not under arrest and did not have his rights read to him.

The police continued the Halbach investigation during November and December of 2005. During this period, they focussed solely on Steven Avery and assumed he’d acted alone. There was no evidence to suspect otherwise, and Brendan Dassey wasn’t on their radar.

This changed in January 2006, when Kayla Avery (Brendan Dassey’s cousin) confided to a school counselor that she suspected Dassey knew something about the Halbach murder. Kayla stated Dassey was “acting weird”—not sleeping and had lost a lot of weight—and becoming very emotional over trivial matters. This went unreported to authorities until it became a tip to the police on February 20, 2006.

On that afternoon, Detectives O’Neill and Baldwin (the same pair who spoke to Dassey on November 6, 2005) attended Dassey’s high school. They interviewed him in a private room and asked him general questions about the case. Dassey said he knew nothing but seemed evasive about seeing Teresa Halbach on the property.

O’Neill and Baldwin conferred with detectives Mark Weigert and Tom Fassbender who would handle Brendan Dassey from then on. Weigert and Fassbender went to Dassey’s high school on February 27, 2006, and spoke with him privately for an hour and forty-five minutes. He was not read his rights (the Miranda warning) and had no lawyer or adult present to represent him, however the interview was recorded, and all conversation remains on the record. Towards the end, Dassey, under pressure from the detectives, indicated he had seen Teresa Halbach on the property talking with Steven Avery on the afternoon of October 31, 2005.

The detectives switched tactics from a ‘soft” interview style to what many criticize as a controversial “hard” interrogation process known in law enforcement as the Reid Technique. Employing the Reid Technique to induce a confession is a core issue with today’s online critics assessing whether Brendan Dassey falsely confessed, and we’ll go much further into that arena in a bit. As well, we’ll examine the effect the Miranda Warning had on Brendan Dassey, the lack of legal representation during subsequent police contact, and whether his mental capacity was suitable to truly understand the incriminating statements he was about to make.

At 3:21 pm on February 27, 2006, Detectives Weigert and Fassbender began a firmer interrogation on Brendan Dassey. They’d taken him from school to the police station where they contained him in an audio/video room specifically designed for interrogations. The recording shows that the officers read Dassey his Miranda rights but were specific that he was not under arrest and was free to go at any time. Dassey waived his rights, and no lawyer or supportive adult was present.

The interrogation lasted forty-three minutes and ended when Dassey stated that Avery had told him what happened—Avery stabbed Halbach and transported her body to the firepit on a snowmobile sled. Further, Dassey alleged that Avery told him he hid the knife under Halbach’s vehicle seat.

Now the detectives took an unusual step. They contacted Dassey’s mother and had her and Brendan taken to a hotel and kept overnight under police guard. It’s assumed the detectives returned to the Avery property for a search, and it’s recorded that Weigert and Fassbender went to the hotel late in the evening and had an unrecorded conversation with Brendan Dassey.

On the morning of March 1, 2006, Weigert and Fassbender had a four-hour and nineteen-minute recorded session with Dassey. This time, they used a soft interview setting, and this video became the central piece of incriminating evidence used to convict Dassey. It’s meandering to view and considerably complex to understand exactly what Dassey says.

To paraphrase rambling, he eventually states he was with Steven Avery while Avery had Teresa Halbach tied naked to a bed while they both raped her. Then, according to Dassey’s confession, Avery stabbed and shot Halbach and both took her body to the burn pit. In one fleeting moment, Brendan Dassey says he cut Teresa Halbach’s throat, and this is the statement portion that secured his first-degree murder conviction.

Watch the Brendan Dassey confession video.

Brendan Dassey was charged with Halbach’s murder and remained in custody through his lengthy legal process. He was convicted in a jury trial on April 27, 2007, and was sentenced (at 17 years old) to life imprisonment. His first appeal was denied and Dassey entered the mainstream penitentiary system.

In 2010, Dassey entered a motion for a retrial based on the grounds of rights infringement leading to a false confession. It was denied by the trial court and reaffirmed denial by the Wisconsin Court of Appeals in January 2013. The Wisconsin Supreme Court declined to review that denial, and it wasn’t until the first Netflix series Making a Murder aired in 2015 that Dassey’s case took on a new life. There was so much public outcry that Dasey’s new lawyer, Laura Nirider, successfully won a writ of habeas corpus in a federal court that ordered a judicial review on the grounds that Dassey’s juvenile confession had been coerced and therefore was involuntary and unconstitutional.

In August 2016, United States magistrate judge William E. Duffin agreed with the false confession position. He called the case a “horrific miscarriage of justice”. Subsequently, the Wisconsin Justice Department appealed Duffin’s decision to the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh District which agreed to review matters but denied Dassey’s release from custody.

In June 2017, a three-panel of appellate judges upheld the magistrate’s decision to overturn Dassey’s conviction, but the justice department immediately filed an en banc rehearing where the entire appellate panel must rule, not three judges but all seven. On December 8, 2017, the panel voted 4-3 to reinstate Dassey’s conviction. Brendan Dassey lost his final legal battle on June 25, 2018, when the United States Supreme Court refused to hear the matter—no reasons given. He now remains in prison until at least 2048.

So, that’s the timeline and the case facts of how Brendan Dassey’s legal path played out. Let’s look at whether there was any fact in the confession that caused this path, and this starts with examining if his confession or statement to the police was legal.

Admissibility of Statements Given to Persons in Authority

The core legal argument around Dassey’s conviction is that his confession—a statement, in legal terms—should not have been admitted or allowed to be entered as evidence at his jury trial. After all, there was absolutely no physical or other incriminating evidence to independently support or corroborate that Dassey was being truthful in his March 1, 2006, statement during his interrogation with Detectives Weingert and Fassbender. Without Dassey’s confession, the state had no evidence against him, and the charges would have to have been dismissed.

Note that of all the interview/interrogation sessions Dassey encountered with the police (who are considered persons in authority)—seven in total as there were two more after his March 1, 2006, statement—only one was brought before the court and ruled on about admissibility. The process of ruling on a statement’s admissibility is called voir dire which is a trial within a trial and held away from the jury’s presence. If the voir dire finds the statement to meet the admissibility threshold, then the jury is allowed to see and hear the evidence. If the voir dire finds the statement is ruled inadmissible, then the evidence cannot be presented.

There are two main tests for the admissibility of statements given to persons in authority. One is that the statement must be voluntary. The other is that it must be given from a clear and operating mind. Voluntariness is subjective. The statement cannot be coerced or induced by threat or promise of favor. Free and operating mind is objective. The statement maker must know what they are doing and what the ramifications are for making their statement. In other words, they knew what they were getting into.

As strange as it might sound, there’s no legal requirement that the statement be true. If a confession is false—as in the person lying or making up the confession—that has no bearing on its admissibility. If the judge, as the trier of law, determines the accused provided the statement voluntarily through a free and operating mind, then they are required to allow the jury to access it. It’s the jurors, as the triers of fact, who determine how reliable or truthful the evidence from the statement or confession is.

The fundamental question is, “Do the jurors believe the accused person is telling the truth when they confess to a crime?” It’s of no concern to the jurors as to how the confession was obtained. It’s just a matter of credibility, and the jurors in Brendan Dassey’s trial must have believed his confession as it was the only evidence of Dassey’s put before them and they convicted him of first-degree murder (planned and deliberate) based upon his statement evidence.

Miranda and an Accused Person’s Rights

There’s a long-standing US Supreme Court ruling called Miranda where a person dealing with the police, as a suspect or an accused, must be read their rights by the officers involved with the proceedings. This dates to 1966 in Miranda v Arizona where Ernesto Arturo Miranda was charged with robbery, kidnapping, and rape. The ruling affirmed that Miranda’s 5th and 6th Amendment rights were violated upon his arrest and interrogation, so the evidence gleaned from not telling Miranda about his right to remain silent and his right to a lawyer was not admissible. The operating words in Miranda are arrest, custody, and interrogation.

There is no standard Miranda rights wording. The requirement lies in the authorities telling a suspect or detainee:

  • They have the right to remain silent.
  • Anything the suspect does say can and may be used against them in a court of law.
  • They have the right to have an attorney present before and during the questioning.
  • They have the right, if they cannot afford the services of an attorney, to have one appointed, at public expense and without cost to them, to represent them before and during the questioning.

Over the years, Miranda warnings (cautionings) have evolved into pretty much this:

You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can be used against you in court. You have the right to talk to a lawyer for advice before we ask you any questions. You have the right to have a lawyer with you during questioning. If you cannot afford a lawyer, one will be appointed for you before any questioning if you wish. If you decide to answer questions now without a lawyer present, you have the right to stop answering at any time.

Officer Arresting Young Man

A key issue explored at a criminal trial is not that a Miranda warning was issued. It must, but it’s whether the accused person understood the concept and whether they exercised or waived their rights when incriminating themselves. This loops to a freely operating mind and voluntariness which, in turn, loops to the influence of threats, promises, inducements, and coercion. And, although not required, veracity of the information—is it true? And can the truth be independently corroborated by facts, preferably key facts which are only known to the perpetrator of the crime and the inner investigation circle?

Threats, Promises, Inducements, Coercion, and the Reid Interrogation Technique

All criminal investigation conversations involve discourse between civilians and persons in authority. Interviews, generally, are non-confrontational, fact-finding, information-gathering sessions. Interrogations, on the other hand, are adversarial, guilt-finding confrontations. Interviews don’t require Miranda warnings. Interrogations do.

Brendan Dassey’s first two contacts with persons in authority were fact-finding interviews. The second raised police suspicions that Dassey knew more than he was telling and, possibly, was Steven Avery’s accomplice. This moved the fence in his third police contact on February 27, 2006, when the detectives elicited from Dassey that he saw Teresa Halbach with Steven Avery and they suspected Dassey probably knew a lot more of what happened, as in aiding and abetting Avery to kill Halbach.

In reviewing the transcripts from the February 27 schoolhouse interview to the same-day police station interrogation, I can clearly see Detectives Weigert and Fassbender moving their strategy from interview to interrogation There’s no question, in my opinion, that Weigert and Fassbender knew exactly what they were doing. Like me, they were schooled in the Reid Interrogation Technique and had previously practiced it.

Properly employed, Reid works. But I have to say, at this point in this post, that all Reid confessions MUST be backed up by independent corroborative facts that verify truthfulness in confessions, and that they were not induced by threats, promises, and coercion that can elicit false confessions. Reid has many critics, in the legal world and the online world, and they all point to the potential of false confessions resulting from the psychological manipulation power practiced in Reid. Here’s a previous blog post I wrote about the Reid Interrogation Technique. Let’s quickly review what Reid is and later see if the technique contributed to Brendan Dassey’s confession as many learned and armchair critics claim as fact.

The Reid Technique was developed in the 1960s by an American polygraphist named John Reid. It’s a blueprint for psychologically manipulating criminals into confessing to their crimes. It’s standard training for investigators and has been used thousands and thousands of times to elicit confessions. A textbook Reid Technique interrogation involves nine progressive steps:

1. Confrontation — The interrogator presents the facts and asks for response.

2. Theme Development — The interrogator develops a story of why the crime happened.

3. Stopping Denials — Any denials by the suspect are shot down.

4. Overcoming Objections — The interrogator focuses on the truth.

5. Getting Suspect’s Attention — Keep the suspect listening to the narrative.

6. Suspect Loses Resolve — Denials are stopped and objections are overcome.

7. Alternatives — The interrogator offers a way out and that is to confess.

8. Bringing Suspect Into Conversation — Getting the suspect to talk.

9. The Confession — The suspect is psychologically broken and confesses.

Note that I said a “textbook” Reid confession. In these nine steps, an interrogator must play within the Miranda and admissibility rules for the confession to be used as evidence of guilt. If the rules are violated, then regardless of how skillfully a Reid Technique was applied, the evidentiary value is worthless. The same goes for truthfulness and that’s were independent corroboration comes in. Let’s now examine Brendan Dassey’s confession that earned him life behind bars.

Brendan Dassey’s Confession

On March 1, 2006, Detectives Weigert and Fassbender interrogated Brendan Dassey in a video/audio recorded and controlled environment. I’ve watched and dissected the four-hour and nineteen-minute session, and I can confidently say this is not the “dangerous” classic or textbook Reid procedure that so many internet critics and legal analysts claim produces false confessions. The detectives didn’t have to use a full Reid. They’d already aligned with Brendan Dassey from 1 to 7. They only used Step 8—Bringing Suspect Into Conversation. The overall Reid Technique’s progressive psychological breakdown had nothing to do with causing Brendan Dassey to say he helped rape and murder Teresa Halbach.

What Detectives Weigert and Fassbender did was simply pry words from Dassey’s mouth, bit-by-bit over a long, long time. They used a constant theme of telling the truth, and by telling the truth, things would “go much easier on him in the long run”. However, this is an outstanding violation of the admissibility test where an inducement is offered by promise of favor. This wasn’t a one-time infraction. The entire converse is loaded with coaxing. There is no way Brendan Dassey would have said the incriminating and damaging statements he made if the detectives hadn’t continually induced him.  It was wrenched out of a low functioning kid. There was nothing voluntary about this.

Watch the Brendan Dassey confession video.

In fairness to Detectives Weigert and Fassbender, at no time were they rude, threatening, or in any way aggressive to Dassey. They were somewhat deceitful, which is a court-accepted tactic, but I believe they were acting in what they thought was good faith for the interest of Teresa Halbach’s murder case. Their flaw, however, was having a preconceived picture of where Dassey might have fit with Steven Avery’s actions. The entire shape of the interrogation was to have Dassey admit to some version of their theory. For this reason alone, to preserve fairness in the process, the confession should not have been admitted into evidence and therefore Brendan Dassey should not have been convicted because of his confession—his statement to the police.

A second reason to have the confession legally set aside is the issue of a free and operating mind. From the opening minutes of the interrogation video, it’s apparent Brendan Dassey is cognitively impaired. He’s a vulnerable youth—a naïve and unsophisticated sixteen-year-old boy with the mental capacity of a child facing two seasoned homicide detectives. And he’s unrepresented by a lawyer. Not even his mother was there.

Now, nonrepresentation isn’t a Miranda violation, but Dassey’s ability to knowingly and intelligently waive his rights, and appreciate the seriousness of the situation that was about to affect the rest of his life, simply was not there.

This brings me to assess the reliability of what Brendan Dassey says in his confession. He’s all over the place when it comes to detail. Most of his inconsistent, yet incriminating, moments come when he agrees to suggestions put forward by his interrogators. There was nothing Dassey says that can be verified as truthful through independent corroboration which is critically necessary to support such a damaging thing as an induced murder confession, especially from a juvenile.

As Brendan Dassey said when he testified at his trial, “What I said was false. They got into my head. I told them what they wanted to hear. I guessed at answers, just like I do with my homework.”

In my opinion, Dassey’s statement to Detectives Weigert and Fassbender made on March 1, 2006, should never have been allowed before a jury. Having the confession legally rejected at voir dire would have negated his conviction. There was nothing else to prove his guilt. Also, in my opinion, there’s a high likelihood Brendan Dassey falsely confessed due to psychological manipulation, and he was wrongfully convicted by an admissible false confession.

If that’s the truth, it’s a horrific miscarriage of justice, indeed.

NETFLIX MAKING A MURDERER — DID POLICE REALLY FRAME STEVEN AVERY?

Several years ago, Netflix ran a highly popular series on the case of Steven Avery who was convicted in the 2005 murder of Teresa Halbach that occurred at Manitowoc County, Wisconsin. Despite pleas of innocence and multiple appeals, Avery remains in jail serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole. The series titled Making a Murderer documented the investigation and legal process in such a way that it left many viewers to wonder, “Did police really frame Steven Avery?”

Netflix aired a ten-part series in 2015 that examined Avery’s early life and the events leading to the Halbach murder conviction. The show was so successful that Netflix produced a sequel in 2018, taking on the justice system. The two documentaries have roused both supporters of an innocent man being wrongfully convicted as well as critics claiming the shows were grossly slanted for sensationalism and purposely left out incriminating evidence that proved Avery’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

“Beyond a reasonable doubt.” That’s the standard required by American criminal courts to secure a credible conviction, and that conclusion must be reached through the application of evidence that’s both credible and legally admissible. Planted evidence—false evidence that’s been manufactured and placed to “frame” an accused person—is neither credible nor admissible and is taking the miscarriage of justice to its highest level. Let’s examine the key evidence points in the Teresa Halbach murder case and see if police really framed Steven Avery.

Before diving deep into the evidence, it’s necessary to know a few facts about Steven Avery and how he became involved with Teresa Halbach. Avery was born on July 9, 1962, in Manitowoc County, Wisconsin. From an early age, it was known Avery was a slow developer. His school records reported his IQ at 70 and he dropped out in grade ten.

Steven Avery’s folks owned a business called Avery’s Auto Salvage where he worked doing odd labor jobs. In 1981, he was caught burglarizing a local bar and spent 10 months in jail for it. Upon release, he was charged with animal cruelty for pouring gasoline over a cat and tossing it into a bonfire. This got him another 9 months.

More jail time happened for Steven Avery in 1985 when he forced a woman off the road at gunpoint. (What started this is the woman accused Avery of indecently exposing himself to her.) Avery drew a 6-year sentence for the firearm offense but was granted bail upon an appeal.

While out of custody in late 1985, a woman was raped on a beach near Two Rivers, Wisconsin. Because of the assailant’s description, Avery—well-known to the local police—became a suspect. The victim picked Steven Avery out of a photo lineup. He was charged, convicted, and sentenced to 32 years concurrent to the 6-year firearm term.

In 2003, after serving 18 years, Avery’s sexual assault conviction was overturned when the DNA evidence collected in the Two Rivers case was retested. The sample eliminated Steven Avery as the donor and positively identified another sex offender, Gregory A. Allen, as committing the rape. Avery, a truly wrongfully convicted man, was freed and he launched a $36 million lawsuit against all involved in the justice miscarriage including the Manitowoc County police. (This was later settled at $400,000.)

Steven Avery returned to Manitowoc County and went back to work at his parent’s auto-salvage business. One of Avery’s jobs was to prepare used cars to be sold on Auto Trader which required professionally taken pictures of the vehicles being displayed in the ads. Here’s where Teresa Halbach came in.

Halbach worked as a photographer for a Manitowoc agency. During the summer and fall of 2005, Teresa Halbach made five visits to Avery’s Auto Salvage to shoot cars for Auto Trader. Each time she dealt with Steven Avery, and each time he requested her, personally, to come out and take the photos. She made a sixth trip to meet Steven Avery on the late afternoon of October 31, 2005, and was never seen alive again.

Teresa Halbach’s family reported her as a missing person two days later. Officers from the Manitowoc County police attended Avery’s business on November 3, 2005, as it was the last known point of contact for Halbach. They spoke to Steven Avery who stated Halbach had been there, took her photos, then left in her vehicle—a Toyota RAV4—around 4:30 pm. Avery said he had no idea where she went.

The police were suspicious but had no evidence to expand on. Halbach had vanished. Her vehicle was gone. Her cell phone was inactive, and her bank cards hadn’t been used.

The Manitowoc police returned to Avery’s property on November 5. They found Halbach’s RAV4 partially hidden at the back of the property. Subsequently, they obtained a search warrant and went through the place on November 8. Behind Steven Avery’s detached garage, they found a firepit. It contained the nearly incinerated remains of Teresa Halbach.

The search, and subsequent searches, found considerable evidence showing Avery was criminally connected to murdering Halbach. Before listing and discussing the validity of that evidence, it’s important to know two things.

One is the Manitowoc County police realized the potential conflict of interest in investigating Steven Avery for a serious crime given he currently had the police department and specific officers under a massive lawsuit. They enlisted the help of neighboring Calumet County police as well as the Wisconsin State police for oversight and evidence processing.

The other is the prosecution and defense positions at the trial. The DA posited that Avery intentionally lured Halbach to his property to rape and kill her—that it was planned and premediated which constituted first-degree murder. The State’s case was that Avery shot Halbach in the head inside his garage with a .22 caliber rifle. The bullet exited and remained on the concrete floor. Then he took her body behind the shop and placed it in an earthen pit, burning it using tires as an accelerant. After, he stashed her vehicle and partly covered it as a disguise but kept the ignition key after disabling the battery, cutting himself in the process. Avery also attempted to dispose of Halbach’s cell phone, camera, palm pilot, and purse in a burning barrel close to the fire pit.

The defense’s stance was that all the evidence was phony as it was fabricated and planted by the police to frame Steven Avery.

Here’s a list of the prominent physical evidence admitted in court that secured Steven Avery’s murder conviction:

  1. A fired.22 caliber bullet containing Teresa Halbach’s DNA — found in the garage.
  2. A .22 caliber rifle that fired that bullet — found in Avery’s house.
  3. An ignition key from Halbach’s vehicle containing Avery’s DNA — found in his bedroom.
  4. Avery’s blood — found in Halbach’s vehicle.
  5. Halbach’s skull bone fragments — found in the fire pit with an evident gunshot wound consistent with the .22.
  6. Halbach’s vehicle — found partially hidden on Avery’s property.
  7. Halbach’s personal effects — found partially burned in the barrel.

Let’s discuss each evidence point and why the Netflix documentary suggested that police had planted the evidence to frame Steven Avery.

The fired .22 bullet.

This was found on the concrete floor of Avery’s garage under a portable air compressor. It was missed in an initial search which led to speculation that the police had returned with it to plant in the framing conspiracy. There’s no question that it was fired by the rifle found in Avery’s house. The crime lab conclusively linked it “with the exclusion of all other firearms.” The lab also conclusively linked DNA from blood on the bullet to Teresa Halbach.

The .22 rifle.

The rifle was a Marlin Glenfield model. There was a serial number on it however there was no link to Steven Avery as it was not the type of firearm requiring registration. It was simply hanging on a wall inside Avery’s house. The rifle was not seized during the initial house search. That’s because the bullet hadn’t been found yet, and there was no nexus to the rifle. The crime lab conclusively linked the Marlin .22 as having fired the bullet with Halbach’s DNA on it “with the exclusion of all other firearms”.

The RAV4 ignition key with Avery’s DNA.

This is one of the most hotly contested evidence points in the case. That’s because it was found in Avery’s bedroom—allegedly in plain sight—after police had searched the room twice before. And it was found by one of the Manitowoc officers who was named in Avery’s suit and who had recently ben deposed in a hearing associated with the lawsuit. The crime lab positively identified Avery’s DNA on the key fob and classified it as trace DNA originating from Avery’s sweat.

Avery’s blood found in Halbach’s vehicle.

This is another contentious issue. Blood smears, identified through DNA as originating from Avery, were found on Holbach’s ignition switch, a CD case, on both front seats, and on the hood opening latch. An officer noted a cut on Avery’s right middle finger when he was initially interviewed about Halbach’s disappearance.

Avery’s defense team and the Netflix documentary made a lot of mileage with suggestions that the police had obtained a sample of Avery’s blood and planted it on the vehicle. Their theory had some basis to it. During the post-investigation, a vial of Steven Avery’s blood was found in the Manitowoc police evidence locker. It was taken during the 1985 sexual assault investigation where he was wrongfully convicted and had remained locked up over the years.

Something highly suspicious was around that vial. It was found that the evidence anti-tampering seal had been broken on the storage box and a needle hole was observed having punctured the rubber stopper. Here was the holy tampering grail the defense and the documentary thought they had found. Someone within the police custody chain had taken a syringe of Avery’s blood and smeared it about the RAV4.

“Not so fast,” said the DA. “Back up here and examine the chain of custody ledger. It shows that during the reinvestigation of Avery’s sexual assault conviction, the crime lab had obtained that vial to use a sample of Avery’s blood to extract DNA used to exonerate him. Nothing to see here but we’ll go a step further.”

The vial holding Steven Avery’s blood was a Vacu-tainer that contained an anti-coagulate preservative called ethylenediamine-tetraacetic acid or EDTA for short. This stabilized the blood to keep it stored in the sealed container. To put a rest to the planted blood accusation, the FBI ran a sophisticated test on the six smears found in Halbach’s SUV. There was no trace of EDTA found in those smears concluding that the smears, although positively from Avery, could not have been syringed from the Vacu-tainer and clandestinely placed in the victim’s vehicle.

Halbach’s skull bone fragments.

Two fragments of Teresa Halbach’s skull bone displayed a hole consistent with a .22 caliber gunshot wound. Each half showed a crescent defect that when placed together formed an entire circle. On the inside of the bones was a notable beveling which is caused by the bullet entering from the outer surface, passing through, and blowing out the inner edges along the circumference of the passageway. The significance of this gunshot evidence is a clear nexus to Avery’s guilt—a hole in her head of .22 diameter, a fired.22 bullet with her DNA on it, and the .22 rifle firing the bullet that caused the gunshot wound hanging in Avery’s house.

Halbach’s vehicle found on Avery’s property.

Halbach’s Toyota was found near the rear of the Avery property that measured 80 acres. It was along a fence line and partially hidden with brush and assorted plywood pieces around the sides, making it somewhat hard to see. The keys were out and the battery had been disconnected. This was an obvious attempt at concealment which is consistent with mens rea or a guilty mind.

Halbach’s personal effects found in the barrel.

Again, this was another sign of a guilty mind with an attempt at destroying evidence linking Halbach’s disappearance to Avery. Why they weren’t burnt along with the body, no one seems to know. By the way, Steven Avery never confessed which leads to the biggest controversy in the entire story—one the Netflix documentary Making a Murderer covers in depth and that may have true basis to confirming a massive miscarriage of justice.

Brendan Dassey’s confession in assisting Steven Avery to murder Teresa Halbach.

Anyone who has looked at anything evidentiary in the Avery-Halbach case knows that Stephen Avery’s younger cousin, Brendan Dassey confessed to detectives that he helped Avery restrain, sexually assault, and kill Teresa Halbach, then assisted him with disposing of the body and cleaning the garage.

While I’m completely satisfied that Steven Avery is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of murdering Teresa Halbach, and police in no way fabricated and/or planted evidence to frame Avery, I have severe doubts about the validity of Brendan Dassey’s confession. Apparently, it’s been used as the uncorroborated sole evidence to convict Dassey as complicit in the crime and hand him a life sentence, however with a parole chance in 2048. The possibility of this being a classic case of psychologically manipulating a low-intelligence person into falsely confessing is high. Very high.

In fact, the Dassey confession is so controversial that I’m going to devote a separate blog post to it in Did Brendan Dassey Really Help Steven Avery Murder Teresa Halbach? Watch for this on DyingWords.net two weeks from today.

DID JEFFREY EPSTEIN REALLY KILL HIMSELF

On August 10, 2019, Jeffrey Edward Epstein—a 66-year-old American mega-millionaire and registered sex offender powerfully connected to presidents and royalty—died in his prison cell at the Special Handling Unit of New York’s Metropolitan Correctional Center. The coroner ruled the death a suicide but, shortly, the publicly-exposed mass of improprieties surrounding Epstein’s custody control and supervision within the detention facility raised a massive foul play speculation. Many properly wondered, “Did Jeffrey Epstein really kill himself?”

It wasn’t just the crazy conspiracy theorists who wondered if Epstein truly committed suicide. There were just too many suspicious circumstances to ignore. Switches in cellmate placements. Epstein left unchecked for nearly eight hours before his death while under a suicide watch. Security cameras on his cell being disabled. Guards “asleep” at their station. Falsified records. No cell search for contraband. A blatant disregard for prison policies and procedures set in place to prevent such a death. Plus, the horde of high-profile people Epstein had dirt on.

Then, there’s the autopsy review by America’s high-profile forensic pathologist, Dr. Michael Baden, who said Epstein’s broken neck bones could not have been caused by a self-inflicted, ligature hanging. In Baden’s opinion (who performed more than 20,000 autopsies in his 45-year career), it was far more likely Epstein was a homicide victim than a suicide statistic.

On June 27, 2023, the United States Department of Justice (DOJ), through its Office of the Inspector General (OIG), released a 128-page report on the Jeffrey Epstein in-custody death investigation. Before dissecting the report and reaching a conclusion, let’s review who Jeffrey Epstein was and the facts leading to his sudden and unnatural death.

Putting it bluntly, Jeffrey Epstein was an enormous con man and an extreme pervert. He was born in Brooklyn in 1953 and completed high school with skipped-grades but never sought a college degree. That didn’t stop him from getting a physics and math teacher’s position at the prestigious Dalton School in Manhattan. Epstein was quickly fired for inappropriate behavior towards underage female students.

Epstein reinvented himself as a banker. Given credit where credit is due, Epstein functioned at a near-genius level with figures. He worked his way toward the top of Bear Stearns but was “dismissed” for regulatory violations.

He went on his own, founding International Assets Group which specialized in money recovery for extremely wealthy clients. He once called himself a high-level bounty hunter. Because he excelled at this job, he quickly acquainted himself with some of the richest people in the world as well as those socially and politically elite.

In 1987, Jeffrey Epstein joined Towers Financial Corporation as a “consultant”. By 1993, Towers imploded in one of the biggest Ponzi schemes America had ever seen with over $900 million in today’s value simply gone. Epstein escaped unscratched and went on to an even bigger venture.

He founded J. Epstein & Associates in 1988. Its cover was to manage assets of clients with a minimum of $1 billion net worth—an exclusive club at the least. In 1996, he changed the name to the Financial Trust Company with a new headquarters in the U.S. Virgin Islands tax-shelter haven. Another venture was Liquid Funding Ltd. which was a novel and clever debt-repo service partnered with Bear Stearns that collapsed in the 2008 financial meltdown.

Through these years, Jeffrey Epstein amassed an unknown pot of wealth. Personal properties included a Manhattan mansion, one in Palm Beach, Florida, a New Mexico ranch, and an exotic island getaway called Little Saint James in the Virgin Islands. It was here that some of the sinister sexual seductions with underage girls took place.

Jeffrey Epstein surrounded himself with the elite of the elites. Tarred by the Epstein brush were people like Prince Andrew of the British Royal Family, U.S. Presidents Bill Clinton and Donald Trump, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Cuban Dictator Fidel Castro, financial titans like Bill Gates, Richard Branson, and Rupert Murdoch, and celebrities such as Harvey Weinstein, Woody Allen, Michael Jackson, Alex Baldwin, a host of Kennedys, and the beat goes on.

The Epstein sex scandals surfaced in 2005. The Palm Beach conducted a 13-month undercover investigation on Epstein that brought in the FBI because of its international scale. Eventually, sixty young females gave evidence of being sex-trafficked through Jeffrey Epstein, his properties, and his female co-conspirator, British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell (who is now serving 20 years for sexual offenses against minors).

One of the sworn allegations was that Epstein had 12-year-old triplet girls flown in from France who he sexually assaulted and had them returned the next day. Other girls came from Brazil, the Soviet Union, and across Europe. These minors were facilitated by Maxwell through her contacts in Jean-Luc Brunel’s MC2 Modeling Agency.

Epstein was arrested in Palm Beach in July 2006 on child abuse charges. These serious allegations were plea-bargained down to one count of procuring a minor and one count of soliciting a prostitute. It was called the “sweetheart deal of the century by the U.S. Attorney General who eventually had the prosecutor fired for agreeing to an Epstein guilty plea resulting in 18 months of open custody.

Meanwhile, Epstein went back to work as a money-maker and a kiddie-diddler. Then the civil suits started, and the criminal investigation continued. He was again arrested by the FBI for sexual offenses against minor girls, this time in New York after returning from Europe. That was on July 6, 2019. He was denied bail and sent to the Special Handling Unit (SHU) at the Metropolitan Correction Center (MCC) operated by the Federal Bureau of Prisons (FBP). Epstein remained there for 35 days until he died on August 10.

To understand what led to Jeffery Epstein’s death, it’s vital to know the chain of events that occurred to allow this to happen. This timeline is clearly laid out in Chapter 3 of the DOJ-OIG report titled Timeline of Key Events. Here is a summary.

September 21-24, 2018 — The FBP at MCC contracts to have their video surveillance system updated from analog to digital recorders.

March 17, 2019 — Resources for video upgrades are temporarily reassigned to other work leaving the recording portion half-finished. Livestream cameras are operational for real-time surveillance but cameras in the Special Handling Unit (SHU), including those near Epstein’s future cell won’t record.

July 2, 2029 — A New York federal grand jury indicts Epstein on child sex trafficking charges. A warrant is issued.

July 6, 2019 — Epstein is arrested at a New Jersey airport as he returns from France. He is incarcerated as a pretrial detainee at MCC. The news stories are viral and he is assigned to the SHU for protection from other inmates.

July 8, 2019 — Epstein is arraigned and pleads not guilty. The MCC Chief Psychologist routinely interviews him and finds no evidence of suicidal thoughts.

July 10, 2019 — Guards report Epstein appears “distraught, sad, and a little confused”. A specific suicide risk assessment is done, and the MCC administration assigns Epstein a suitable cellmate as a safety precaution.

July 11, 2019 — Epstein is re-evaluated as a suicide risk. The psychologist minimizes the potential and orders weekly follow-ups.

July 18, 2019 — A federal judge denies Epstein bail even though he offered a $100 million surety. The judge found Epstein “a danger to the community and a flight risk.”

July 23, 2019 — At 1:21 am, guards hear a commotion coming from Epstein’s cell. Epstein was on the floor, semiconscious, with an orange bedsheet strip around his neck. There are notable skin injuries on Epstein’s neck. The cellmate says he woke up hearing Epstein in distress. Epstein said the cellmate tried to kill him. Epstein is moved to the Psychiatry Unit and placed on a suicide watch, alone in a cell.

July 24, 2019 — Epstein is removed from the suicide watch after another psychiatric assessment but is still left alone in a cell at the Psych Unit.

July 25-29, 2019 — Daily interviews are done. Epstein emphatically denies having suicidal tendencies and states he does not remember how he received injuries to his neck.

July 30, 2019 — Epstein is transferred back to the SHU and placed in a cell visible from the guard station. MCC administration orders that Epstein be assigned a new cellmate. A suitable candidate is found and housed with Epstein.

August 2, 2019 — MCC administration concludes its investigation into the suspected Epstein suicide attempt on July 23 and determined they cannot conclusively categorize it as a suicide attempt.

August 8, 2019 — Epstein has a private meeting with his lawyers and updates his will. The prison staff is not aware of this change.

August 9, 2019 — Epstein’s cellmate is moved out at the request of the U.S. Marshals and taken to an out-of-state facility. Epstein is once again alone.

August 9, 2019 — Over two thousand pages of evidence in proceedings against Ghislaine Maxwell are unsealed. They contain very damaging evidence against Epstein, and they receive international media attention. Epstein meets with his lawyers. He then makes an unauthorized phone call to an unknown person.

August 9, 2019 — The last known bed check on Epstein happens at 10:40 pm.

August 10, 2019 — Guards begin breakfast service at 6:30 am. They find Epstein semi-suspended with his buttocks 2 inches from the floor with his legs straight out. A torn prison sheet is noosed around his neck and tied to the upper bunk ladder. Epson is unresponsive. Resuscitation fails, and he’s taken to the morgue.

August 11, 2019 — The New York City Coroner’s Office autopsies Epstein and rules the death a suicide caused by hanging.

June 27, 2023 — The DOG-OIC report titled Investigation and Review of the Federal Prison’s Custody, Care, and Supervision of Jeffrey Epstein at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York, New York is released. They concluded there were “numerous and serious failures by MCC New York staff including multiple violations of MCC and BOP policies and procedures” that included falsifying records to cover up the lack of supervision on the night of August 9/10. The report upheld a suicide ruling and made eight recommendations to minimize a re-occurrence of the Jeffrey Epstein event.

—   —   —

That’s the timeline of what led to Epstein’s death. Let’s deal with the highlights before wrapping up with the biggest issue of all—that the autopsy findings allegedly support a homicide ruling over a suicide.

Cell Search — The BOP has a policy of ongoing cell searches to locate contraband or items that an inmate could use to harm themselves or others. The report found no record that Epstein’s cells had ever been searched and that he had an excess of bed linens that he could use to make a hanging ligature.

Cell Checks — The last recorded cell check on Epstein was at 10:40 pm on August 9. He was found at 6:30 on the 10th. Checks are to be made hourly so that’s eight checks in a row that were missed. This is what the two night-shift guards falsify. However, they were caught by their own cameras.

Faulty Cameras — The conspiracy crowd made a lot of media and internet noise over the “disabled” cameras. The DOJ/OIG report takes a deep dive into this issue in Chapter 6. They found nothing intentional had been done to sabotage the cameras. Every camera aimed at Epstein’s cell was in proper working order except they were only on livestream mode. The recorders had never been updated. Typical bureaucratic inefficiency.

The only recorded video, though, was crucial. That was the camera with both Epstein’s cell door and the guard station in the viewfinder. It was clear evidence that no one had gone near Epstein’s cell door from 10:40 pm until 6:30 am. It was also clear that both guards in the recording never moved from their station during the same time. Apparently, they were asleep. Later, they were convicted of falsifying the bed check documents.

The Cellmates — The report does not name either of Epstein’s cellmates, but it does detail every move, the reasons for the move, and the concern the MCC administration staff had about a suitable watch person being with him at all time.

The Previous Suicide Attempt — The report overrules the MCC finding that there wasn’t sufficient evidence of a clear earlier suicide attempt. The OIG investigation notes this was a huge red flag and Epstein’s supervision should have been done accordingly.

The Ghislaine Maxwell Documents — This was the proverbial straw that broke Epstein’s back. He knew his case was hopeless and that he’d be spending the rest of his life in jail. It was now just waiting a suitable moment for him to hang himself. He found it on the night of August 9/10 when he was alone and unsupervised.

The Will and the Call — Both events seem suspicious, but the report lets the BOP and MCC off light here. There is no way prison officials could know what was going on in a meeting between Epstein and his attorneys. And there is no way to know what was said in a 27-minute private call that happened around 9:00 pm on August 9th despite that Epstein was supposed to be under outgoing call monitoring. He was using an unauthorized smuggled smartphone that should have been discovered if he’d ever had a cell search.

—   —   —

So, let’s deal with the autopsy and the controversial broken neck bones. Dr. Kristen Roman, M.D. was the prosector (a person who dissects bodies.) She was a very experienced forensic pathologist employed by the New York City’s Medical Examiner Office. Her report’s final diagnosis is very clear, and the coroner has never deviated from it. Rather than paraphrase it, see the image below

 

The “broken neck bones” referred to by the news media through Dr. Michael Baden (who was hired by Jeffrey Epstein’s brother to second-guess the suicide ruling) are not bones at all—certainly not true neck bones like the thoracic and cervical vertebrae that make up the upper spine. Dr. Roman refers to “fractures of bilateral thyroid cartilage cornuae and left hyoid cornua”. These two anatomical features are soft cartilage in the throat—one supports the tongue, and the other supports the thyroid gland. They are almost always damaged or “fractured” in ligature hangings.

Let’s go to the source of this “broken neck bone” trouble. Dr. Baden gave an interview to Fox News on October 30, 2019. Here’s a Fox News quote from that show. 

Jeffrey Epstein’s autopsy is more consistent with homicidal strangulation than suicide, Dr. Michael Baden reveals. 

He noted that the 66-year-old Epstein had two fractures on the left and right sides of his larynx, specifically the thyroid cartilage or Adam’s apple, as well as one fracture on the left hyoid bone above the Adam’s apple, Baden told Fox News. 

“Those three fractures are extremely unusual in suicidal hangings and could occur much more commonly in homicidal strangulation,” Baden, who is also a Fox News contributor, said. 

While there’s not enough information to be conclusive yet, the three fractures were “rare,” said Baden, who’s probed cases involving O.J. Simpson, President John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, record producer Phil Spector, New England Patriots star Aaron Hernandez, and many others. 

“I’ve not seen in 50 years where that occurred in a suicidal hanging case,” the 85-year-old medical legend told Fox News.

There are three things wrong with the Baden/Fox release.

  1. Given credit to Dr. Baden for correctly identifying the hyoid and thyroid cartilages, it was Fox News that sensationalized them as a broken neck. ie – this couldn’t have happened in a suicide hanging so it had to be a murder.
  2. Dr. Baden is out-of-line stating the hyoid and thyroid cartilages fractures are extremely unusual in suicidal hangings and are more consistent with manual strangulations.
  3. Dr. Baden infers that he was physically present at the autopsy as an independent observer hired by the Epstein family.

Let’s examine these issues.

Dr. Roman’s autopsy report is very clear. She was the one who examined the body, and her findings are conclusive. She refers to the fractured hyoid and thyroid cartilages and never refers to them as neck bones or a broken neck as in vertebrae fractures. She clearly concludes Epstein hung himself with a torn bedsheet and no one else was directly or indirectly involved in intentionally causing his death.

In Chapter 7 of the OIG report titled Conclusions and Recommendations, the investigators deal with the Baden interview and his statement that fractured hyoid and/or thyroid cartilages rarely occur in suicide ligature suspensions. They interviewed Dr. Roman who contradicted Dr. Baden confirming that these fractures often occur in cases like the Epstein death. She pointed out that the ligature was a wide bedsheet fragment and not a small-diameter cord like the electrical connection on the C-PAC machine found in Epstein’s cell.

Dr. Roman explained the mechanism of the ligature and how the forces worked in this case. Because the fabric and the tied knot were wide, they created an upward furrow that was evident on Epstein’s neck. She stated the force was at the right location and would have exerted sufficient pressure in his suspended position to cause the cartilage fractures—she would have been surprised if the fractures hadn’t occurred.

The pathologist also commented in the OIG report that there was nothing on Epstein’s body to indicate defensive wounds usually seen in violent homicide deaths. There was no bruising except for the ligature location and what’s known as petechiae in the eyes which are small red dots or blood vessel ruptures caused by the circulation interference. Furthermore, there was no debris in his fingernails associated with a fight, and no contusions on his knuckles.

Nowhere in Dr. Roman’s autopsy report and interview with the OIG investigation does she confirm Dr. Baden being at the autopsy. This (in my experience as a homicide investigator and coroner) is highly unlikely. Autopsies, especially forensic autopsies like performed on Jeffery Epstein, are carefully controlled. Only those absolutely necessary may attend.

There would be no value in Baden being there. If he were contracted by the family for a review, he would be supplied with the entire material including photographs, documents, and whatever exhibits had been processed. Baden gave his Fox interview two months after the autopsy. By then, the entire autopsy results would be in and supplied to the family, ergo to Baden.

There’s one more reason that Baden probably wasn’t in that autopsy suite. He’s a publicity-seeking narcissist, and it’s well-known he’s never seen a camera or a mic he didn’t like. Anytime there’s a high-profile death, information processors like Fox News look for sensational sources. Dr. Michael Baden is on their speed dial.

And there’s a credibility issue over the suicide vs homicide conclusion in the Jeffery Epstein postmortem examination. Dr. Kristen Roman received her M.D. in 1999 and was board-certified as a forensic pathologist in 2004. When she autopsied Epstein, she had 15 years of operational experience with the New York Medical Examiner Office as an active prosector. Roman had nothing to gain by not being candid on the Epstein file.

You might want to read this Intelligencer article titled Why You Might Not Want to Believe Michael Baden, Celebrity Pathologist, on Epstein’s Death.

By Jeffrey Epstein committing suicide, he cheated dozens of innocent victims out of justice. It’s a travesty that this travesty developed into the widespread social mockery meme, “… and Epstein didn’t kill himself.”