Pursuing earthly justice, coming up short

Since the release of Making a Murderer, a Netflix true crime, 10-episode documentary, fans have idolized attorney Dean Strang. The series centers on the ongoing case of Strang’s former client, Steve Avery, an auto salvage trader from small Manitowoc, Wis. Avery served 18 years in prison for rape before new DNA technology exonerated him. After his release, police accused Avery of another grisly rape and murder, and a jury sent him back to prison—this time for life.

Nearly 20 million people viewed the series in its first 35 days on Netflix, by some estimates. It strongly suggests Wisconsin police misconduct and Avery’s innocence. Netflix bingers who had never heard of Avery suddenly took to internet message boards and social media to compare theories about how one department could have framed the same man—twice.

Strang is a central character in the documentary. To his surprise, footage of his courtroom speeches and “talking head” monologues about innocence and justice have inspired comparisons to Atticus Finch from the novel To Kill a Mockingbird. Blogs lovingly tease his unremarkable wardrobe choices. Despite his new status as an internet celebrity, Strang visibly cringes when called a heartthrob. He continues to work at a Madison law firm situated comfortably between the white granite of the Wisconsin state capitol building and Lake Monona.

Even on the phone, Strang speaks slowly and carefully, as though still in the courtroom. He says the purpose of the documentary was to prick consciences. Strang doesn’t think the Golden Rule is reflected in American criminal procedure.

“We don’t imagine ourselves in his shoes or her shoes,” he said. “I think we tolerate a level of bureaucratic sloppiness and imbalance in the administration of criminal justice, when that affects others, that we never would tolerate if it affected us.”

Making a Murderer raises significant questions about the handling of both Avery cases by Wisconsin law enforcement. Shown in courtroom footage, Strang and co-attorney Jerry Buting note to the jury numerous ways the local sheriff’s departments failed to handle evidence properly.

“All of us can decide never to commit a crime, but none of us can decide with any certainty that we won’t be accused of a crime,” Strang recently told a commentary website. “If we were accused of a crime, we would want a process that works for us.”

The sixth episode of the series contains a surprisingly captivating 50 minutes of courtroom footage. By then, viewers suspect investigators planted evidence (and did a bad job of it). As Strang and Buting rifle through black boxes of meticulously filed photos, Strang says in a voiceover, “No sane lawyer looks forward to presenting an argument to a jury that the police framed his client. No sane lawyer looks forward to doing that.”

Avery has filed an appeal and has a new attorney. Half a million Netflix viewers have signed a petition asking President Barack Obama to pardon him, but it’s still likely Avery will spend the rest of his life in prison.

With other cases revealing police brutality and possible cover-ups, Strang sees an opportunity for police to examine themselves (using more thorough, media-free internal reviews), and for the public to examine its expectations of police.

“We expect them to keep us safe, but they better not do it in ways that offend us or in ways that we deem excessive after the fact,” he said. “That puts the police in a very, very difficult position.”

In Wisconsin, Capt. Larry Zimney of the Manitowoc Police Department—not the Sheriff’s Department that handled the Avery investigation—sees a troubling pattern since police conduct became an issue in Ferguson, Mo., 18 months ago.

“Every negative incident since then has been publicized by the media,” Zimney said. “When this series came out it just kind of added fuel to the fire. … We live in a glass bowl where everything we do is scrutinized unbelievably.”

But Zimney still believes in the integrity of the system: “I don’t think the justice system is broken. Was the sheriff’s investigation handled correctly? I can’t answer that because I wasn’t a part of it.”

Zimney is concerned about public and media tendencies, although he hasn’t watched the Netflix series. Watching cop shows is the last thing he wants to do when he comes home from work, he said. But he noted a protester at the Manitowoc Courthouse on Jan. 29 told him she could check “going to a protest” off her bucket list.

“I couldn’t help but think to myself, ‘You don’t give a [expletive deleted] about Steven Avery or anybody. You just wanted to come out here, and fulfill your bucket list, and get on TV,’” Zimney said.

Strang also has made good use of the media furor over the case, appearing on everything from CBS’ This Morning to an Irish radio talk show. Although he claims to be a lapsed Catholic (he has divorced and remarried), Strang says his faith gives him “a sense that we’re called upon to serve the less fortunate. A sense that justice is a command. A sense that those who are blessed beyond fair measure have a duty to share with those who are not. A faith that, in the end, over the long haul, the truth wins.”

Keith Findley of the Wisconsin Innocence Project represented Avery before his exoneration and 2003 release.

“The criminal justice system, as a human system, is inevitably flawed,” he recently reminded the public in an op-ed. “It does sometimes send innocent people to prison.”

Strang sees earthly justice as sometimes elusive.

“Very often among mortals, the pursuit of justice is frustrated, the search for the truth comes up short, and in that sense, earthly justice is a pale shadow,” he said. “That doesn’t excuse us from the pursuit, and the search.”