The state Justice Department has filed a 151 page legal brief to back up its claim that Brendan Dassey should remain convicted in the brutal 2005 murder of Teresa Halbach.
The state is appealing a federal magistrate’s decision from August, which overturned Dassey’s conviction for helping his uncle Steven Avery rape, shoot, and burn the 25-year-old Halbach at their family’s auto salvage yard in Manitowoc County. Magistrate William Duffin said Dassey, who was 16 at the time, could not deal with law enforcement techniques that drew confessions out of him.
Duffin said police violated Dassey’s rights but the state insists the confessions were voluntary, and officers used techniques “that have been upheld by court after court.”
The reversal of Dassey’s conviction, and Avery’s new appeal of his, come just months after the Netflix series “Making a Murderer” brought international attention to the case.