Update III: A
ruling handed down in August
in Manitowoc County Circuit Court is an adverse ruling for Steven
Avery, the protagonist and defendant in Wisconsin's Making a Murderer
post-conviction litigation.
The ruling was widely expected. Judge Angela W. Sutkiewicz again failed to schedule any proceedings.
Yet, Sutkiewicz divined that the state destruction of evidence accomplished by a conspiracy that includes two of the DoJ attorneys now defending the conviction in post-conviction litigation was done in good faith, and what the state purported to be a murder victim's remains were not scientifically established as a murder victim's remains, hence the state may secretly destroy the evidence it believed are the remains of a murder victim, and the defendant has no recourse.
Absurd.
Writes Sutkiewicz: "The report of Deputy Hawkins indicates that he, Sergeant Investigator Mark Wiegert, Attorney Thoman Fallon and Attorney Norman Gahn removed materials stored in evidence, and released them to the Halbach family."
Corrupt judges like Judge Angela W. Sutkiewicz are a disgrace.
Can you imagine if Fallon and Gahn had to explain themselves as witnesses in open court?
Wisconsin Attorney General Joshua Kaul continues to allow two DoJ attorneys who disregarded Wisconsin Evidence Preservation statute to work this post-conviction litigation, though their conduct is suspect and worth of a criminal investigation.
Update II: The
Feb 25, 2019 appellate court order mandating "any proceedings necessary to address [Avery's] claims" points to a hearing after briefing at the circuit court to which the case has been sent back.
The Manitowoc circuit court has not set a timeline, a calendar, hence references here to the contemplated hearing use "to-be-scheduled."
The headline should be be changed to reflect the 'as-yet-ordered' status to clarify the hearing has not been scheduled (as noted) meaning not yet ordered.
The appellate court notes the case's "extensive history," that in this case means voluminous law enforcement misconduct that cannot be reasonably adjudicated at circuit court without a hearing, consistent with the appellate court's order of "necessary proceedings" to produce the appellate court's stated desired "ruling," (
p. 3).
Updated - Madison, Wisconsin—The Wisconsin criminal justice system is working against an innocent man.
Not an unusual state of affairs in Wisconsin, but this case—featured in the Emmy-winning Netflix documentary
Making a Murderer—promises to reveal a spectacular law enforcement scandal in a
to-be-scheduled May hearing in Manitowoc County that the
Wisconsin Department of Justice (DoJ) worked to prevent. [See
Appeal Number 2017AP002288 for case history.]
Steven Avery, the twice-wrongfully convicted man, faces multiple Wisconsin law enforcement personnel engaging in misconduct.
Yet no members of Wisconsin law enforcement have stepped forward as whistle-blowers, out of a sense of decency, to simply state,
framing Steven Avery is wrong.
Disgraced ex-District Attorney Ken Kratz
Avery's quest for exoneration is a legal war against the work of Ken Kratz, the disgraced ex-district attorney who is a sex offender (
sexual harassment, and outright assault allegations), who can no longer practice law in Wisconsin because of a suspended license.
 |
Former Calumet County District Attorney,
Ken Kratz, helped frame, and prosecuted
the wrongfully convicted Steven Avery, say
Avery's advocates. Kratz' law license
is suspended in Wisconsin. |
Kratz' legal and personal reputations have taken such a beating that he is attempting to sell the Internet domain name of his private law office,
Kratzlawfirm.
Kratz Law Firm, LLC [Entity ID K040945] dissolved in February 2012, according to records at the
Wisconsin Dept of Financial Institutions (DFI).
As late as 2015, Kratz claimed to be doing business in
private practice in Superior, Wisconsin, at Kratz Law Firm (
Mal Contends).
A search of Wisconsin DFI records reveal no business entities registered to Kratz during 2015, or after Feb 2012.
This raises the question, why was Kratz claiming to do business as Kratz Law Firm, LLC, when state records reveal that no such business entity existed after February 2012?
Attorney General Josh Kaul
No matter.
Attorney General Josh Kaul (D) has taken up defending
Kratz' bad-faith prosecution.
 |
Under the administration of Attorney General Joshua
Kaul (D), the Wisconsin Department of Justice (DoJ) refused
to address the merits of
Steven Avery's characterization
of Wisconsin's post-conviction misconduct
— DoJ bad faith, evidence destruction and suppression
— because the DoJ cannot credibly do so. |
In under three months since
assuming office, Kaul has presided over both committing and defending acts of evidence concealment and destruction, while misleading Avery's attorneys and state appellate justices (p. 2.
March 11, 2019 Supplemental § 974.06 Motion for Post-Conviction Relief
Pursuant to State's Violation of Wis. Stat § 968.205 and Youngblood v.
Arizona).
Kaul proved anew
Wisconsin Democrats are as complicit as Republicans
in defending wrongful convictions, deflating hopes the Wisconsin
police-prosecutor state is under serious challenge by reformists after the 2018 elections.
Notes Avery's attorney,
Kathleen Zellner, in her Feb. 1 legal filing.
The [State] ... conveys an attitude of impunity for its past
actions of withholding exculpatory evidence and its current action of
continuing the concealment of its destruction of potentially exculpatory
or useful evidence. ...
The State wants this Court to overlook the undisputed fact that 2 weeks
ago, on December 28, 2018, when it filed its response to Mr. Avery's
request for new DNA testing of the bones from the Manitowoc Gravel Pit,
it never once admitted or disclosed that it had given the bones back to
the Halbach family in 2011 without notice to Mr. Avery or his counsel.
(Plaintiff-Respondent's Response in Opposition to the Petition to Stay
the Appeal and Remand this Case to the circuit court, December 28, 2018,
pp. 1-8). Instead, the State carried on its charade of concealment by
claiming that Mr. Avery could voluntarily dismiss his pending appeal
(pp. 1,2) (emphasis added).
The
Court of Appeals agreed with Zellner.
Reads the
Feb. 25 Court ruling in part:
The State’s objection does not address the merits of Avery’s claimed
statutory and constitutional violations, and it has not responded to
Avery’s supplemental filings alleging the possible destruction of
evidentiary items which, it appears, the parties previously agreed to
preserve.
The State suggests that the appeal is languishing and that if Avery
wishes to pursue new claims outside the scope of the WIS. STAT. § 974.06
post-conviction orders presently on appeal, he could dismiss the pending
appeal, or wait until its conclusion to file his new claims. As to the
former, Avery understandably disagrees, aware that dismissing this appeal will preclude review of the underlying orders entered to date (emphasis added).
The State previously suggested to the Court in its Dec. 28, 2018 filing
that Avery and Zellner drop their appeal without the state ever having
"admitted or disclosed that it had given the bones back to the Halbach
family in 2011 without notice to Mr. Avery or his counsel," notes
Kathleen Zellner her Feb. 1 Reply filing.
The DoJ can be counted on to do its worst in this post-conviction litigation.
Wisconsin v. Steven Avery (
2017AP002288)
The DoJ improbably cleared Manitowoc County law enforcement, including District Attorney Denis Vogel, for the first wrongful prosecution of Avery (
Amy Lehmann, Deb Strauss, Peg Lautenschlager. DoJ Avery Review. Dec 17 2003).
The DoJ's Division of Criminal Investigation's (DCI) Deb Strauss, co-author the 2003 review that cleared Manitowoc County en masse, was so eager to pin another violent crime on Avery, that when murder victim Teresa Halbach went missing, Strauss contacted Calumet County offering to investigate Avery.
What was Strauss doing?
Now, the DoJ under Attorney General Kaul's administration is engaging in its own misconduct in obstruction (
Rolling Stone).
One wonders if Kaul will order a review of the second investigation and prosecution of Avery after the conclusion of Avery's post-conviction litigation.
Further subjects of a DoJ review should include the DoJ's own attorneys and the facts and circumstances of their conduct in the post-conviction litigation.
For Wisconsin law enforcement and adjudication of criminal justice, we are a nation of men and women, laws and ethics are optional.
In opposing
post-conviction litigation by concealing evidence against Avery, (
Making a Murderer),
Wisconsin Attorney Josh Kaul (D) is offering polemics, pointless
antagonism and the defense of apparent criminality and willful violation of
constitutional rights and state law committed by Wisconsin law enforcement.
Kaul is delaying the inevitable, defending a miscarriage of justice and doing dishonor to Wisconsin.
I have lived in Wisconsin all my life, and I do not see the bottom, though Josh Kaul is dredging the filth of Wisconsin as he blocks, obscures and delays, motivated from a pathology only Kaul can truly explain.
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