GWEN IFILL: Netflix has announced its video streaming service will soon be available globally,
leading to a wider audience for its movies and original programming.
There is no bigger hit on Netflix right now than "Making a Murderer," the story of a brutal
case in Wisconsin that raises troubling questions about our criminal justice system.
William Brangham has the story.
And a warning: If you have not seen the series, like me, there are some spoilers ahead.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: "Making a Murderer" is the new blockbuster true crime series on Netflix.
In 10 hour-long episodes, filmmakers Laura Ricciardi and Moira Demos tell the story of
Steven Avery, a Wisconsin man who spent 18 years locked up for a sexual assault he didn't
commit.
But, after his release, Avery was arrested for a new crime, the gruesome murder of a
young photographer named Teresa Halbach.
STEVEN AVERY, Suspect: I didn't do it.
MAN: Who did it?
STEVEN AVERY: I don't know.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: The series documents, in incredible detail, the investigation and prosecution
of Avery, and his young nephew, Brendan Dassey.
Both men were found guilty, are now serving life sentences for Halbach's death.
The series raises some troubling questions about how investigators and prosecutors pursued
the case.
For example, was then-16-year-old Brendan Dassey coerced into making a false confession?
MAN: Who shot her in the head?
BRENDAN DASSEY, Suspect: He did.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Was crucial evidence linking Avery to the crime in fact planted by police?
And were police trying to frame him because Avery was suing them for $36 million over
his earlier wrongful conviction in the sexual assault case?
"Making a Murderer" was released in its entirety just before Christmas, and it's quickly become
a runaway success for Netflix.
Tens of thousands of viewers are so convinced of Steven Avery's and Brendan Dassey's innocence
that they have signed online petitions to President Obama and to the governor of Wisconsin,
demanding the men be pardoned immediately.
Yesterday, I spoke with the filmmakers, Ricciardi and Demos, who spent 10 years documenting
this story.
So, what was it that first attracted you two to this story?
MOIRA DEMOS, Filmmaker, "Making a Murderer": Here was a man who had been clearly failed
by our justice system in the mid-'80s, and here he was now thrown back into the system,
and we were in a position where we could follow that case as it unfolded.
It's not really about the question of, did Steven do this or he did not do this, but
really, can we trust, we can rely on these verdicts?
And what we felt like that offered and what Steven's experiences offered us was this amazing
window into the system.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: The prosecutor in this murder case, Ken Kratz, has been on a full-bore media
blitz recently, denouncing the series, saying it's extremely misleading, and rejecting the
allegation that Steven Avery was framed.
KEN KRATZ, Prosecutor: This wasn't a documentary at all.
This was a defense piece.
It was generated by and for Steven Avery by his defense team.
If some of the evidence that was selected, I would call it handpicked or cherry-picked,
over an 18-month period, didn't fit with the narrative, didn't fit with the conclusion
that Mr. Avery was the product of a conspiracy or some planted evidence, it's my belief that
the filmmakers just wouldn't include that information.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Kratz argues that several crucial pieces of evidence were either glossed
over by the Netflix series or left out altogether, for example, the fact that Steven Avery called
the murder victim several times on the day that she disappeared, or the fact that Steven
Avery's own DNA showed up on the victim's car keys, on the hood of her car, and inside
her car.
I mean, the prosecutor says that you guys, the filmmakers, didn't include certain pieces
of evidence because -- quote -- "You didn't want to muddy up a perfectly good conspiracy
movie with what actually happened."
MOIRA DEMOS: I guess I would say he didn't want to muddy up a perfectly good prosecution
with what actually happened.
I mean, we included the evidence that Kratz himself spoke about in press conferences as
being the most damning pieces of evidence of Avery's guilt, the most significant physical
pieces evidence.
We were following his lead of what to include.
And, of course, we couldn't include everything from a six-week trial.
And now the things he is saying are the proof of Steven's guilt were not the things he was
hanging his case on.
LAURA RICCIARDI, Filmmaker, "Making a Murderer": Well, I have said before that we had no horse
in this race.
We -- whether Steven Avery committed the horrible crime with which he was charged or not was
of no consequence to us as documentarians.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: "Making a Murderer" is just the latest in a recent line of extremely popular
reexaminations of old criminal cases.
Of course, there was "Serial," the blockbuster podcast that, in its first season, scrutinized
the late '90s conviction of a Maryland teenager for the murder of his ex-girlfriend, and HBO's
popular miniseries "The Jinx," which looked into the crimes of accused murderer Robert
Durst.
Your series obviously comes in a long line of these true crime cases of late.
And I wonder why they are so, so popular with their audiences.
Why do you think these stories speak to us so strongly?
MOIRA DEMOS: I guess, not always, but quite often, true crime revolves a marginal character,
an underdog, so to speak.
And I think most people feel like underdogs in their own lives.
And they can attach to that feeling.
And then, of course, this is true crime.
This is real life.
And there is something very immediate about that.
The fact that people can do something with the feelings they have after they watch, I
think, just adds a layer of intensity to it.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: As for those pardons, President Obama can't do anything about this, because
these weren't federal convictions.
Wisconsin's governor, Scott Walker, could do something, but he recently threw cold water
on the idea.
GOV.
SCOTT WALKER (R), Wisconsin: Just because a documentary on TV says something doesn't
mean that is actually what the evidence shows.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: For now, Steven Avery remains in jail for life.
Brendan Dassey won't be eligible for parole until 2048.
For the "PBS NewsHour," I'm William Brangham.