Relic Worlds Book 1 is now on Audible

Relic Worlds, Book 1: Lancaster James and the Search for the Promised World, is now an audiobook available on Audible.  If you join audible, you can get the book for free!  The audio was done by a wonderful actor named Jon Ryan, who added music and some sound effects to give it the proper feeling.  You can find it at:

http://www.amazon.com/Relic-Worlds-Lancaster-Search-Promised/dp/B01AIYMH6C/ref=sr_1_1_twi_audd_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1453169725&sr=8-1&keywords=Relic+Worlds

Why Can't Steven Avery of Making a Murderer Get a New Trial?

Like so many people I watched in horror as the events of Making a Murderer unfold.  The police corruption is undeniable.  The fact that they planted evidence is pretty obvious, and their bully tactics to lead to a confession are undeniable.  I’m not 100% certain of Steven Avery’s guilt or innocence as I did not see the whole trial, but the guilt of the police in shoddy, unethical, and illegal police work is undeniable.

The reaction of the public has been the obvious response, to petition for a new trial, and to try to convince the federal government to step in.  Unfortunately, both are futile gestures.  Murder is a state crime, not a federal one, so neither the president, nor any federal representative, can step in.  Legally, it is a matter for the state to handle, and we’ve already seen that the powers that be in Wisconsin don’t want to do anything about it.

As for a new trial, that can only happen if new evidence is brought forward.  It doesn’t matter how much one proves that their trial was tarnished, they cannot receive a new one.  One can bring charges against the people who fixed the trial, thus placing more people in jail, but the person whose life was ruined by the unfair trial remains in prison.  This is one of the many reasons that our prisons are overcrowded.

If there’s one thing we should be learning from this documentary it’s that the legal system is completely messed up.  It protects rules more than it does the public.  Even in the face of overwhelming proof that a wrong has been done to someone, and continues to be done to them, the rules are in place to protect the system rather than the individual.

In my book Pro Bono I follow the case my father and grandfather were involved in, defending a 14-year-old girl named Caril Fugate who was sent to prison for assisting her ex-boyfriend on a murder spree.  There were mounds of evidence that she had nothing to do with the murders, including the fact that in the end she ran to the police and was the reason her ex-boyfriend was even captured.  Yet the prosecuting attorney, who had already filed charges against her before she escaped, did everything he could to gather evidence against her, even interrogating her without a lawyer, or even telling her that he had pressed charges against her.  Like in the Avery case, he did not investigate the crime from both sides before coming to a conclusion; he was looking for a promotion, which comes about by a high conviction rate, not from a rate of fairness.

Caril’s trial was as absurd as Steven Avery’s.  Seventy-two violations were later cited, including a juror who made a bet that she would be found guilty, the judge not allowing my grandfather’s partner to work on the case, and the fact that Caril was interrogated without being offered a lawyer, even after she asked for one.

Despite all this, she was denied a new trial.  The first problem with her case and with Avery’s was that the judge who handled the original case was in charge of deciding whether or not they’d get new trials.  In this they are being expected to admit their own guilt and/or incompetence, so the very act of asking them for a new trial is a waste of time lawyers have to do in the appeals process.  They can then climb a legal ladder that is set up to protect its own system rather than find what’s fair.

Most absurdly, the defense attorneys, if they’ve stuck around, must find something new to introduce into a new trial.  Even in the face of overwhelming evidence that the trial was fixed, such as in Steven Avery and his nephew’s cases, the conviction will remain as is unless new evidence can be brought forward.  They might bring it to the Supreme Court eventually, but they only consider cases that affect the entire nation.  Again, justice isn’t concerned with one man.  The system, as it currently stands, does not care about being fair, only about protecting itself.

The only chance some of these people have is if they’ve been given a chance at parole.  As they point out in Making a Murderer, the convict must then admit to being guilty in order to have a chance at parole.  They have to admit guilt so they can show how they’ve changed and deserve a new chance.  Caril went through this exact dilemma after she exhausted all chances at a new trial.  When the parole board asked her how much she had changed, she said it was an unusual subject for her.  She still maintained her innocence, but she knew no trial was possible.  She still satisfied the parole board by saying she had indeed changed in prison over the past 17 years, however, which is why she was finally released.

Steven Avery does not have that chance this time.  He was convicted without the possibility of parole.  This always looks good for prosecutors on their records because they’re “tough on crime.”  However, it really means that innocent people are denied a last chance at justice, as messed up as it might be.  This is also a problem with the death penalty, as that final solution of course denies any chance at later restitution; and as we’ve seen in Making a Murderer, police can, and have, set people up.

The best way to fix all of this is to change the system overall.  When I was doing research for Pro Bono, I was appalled at how fixed the system was toward keeping people in jail, even in the face of obvious and overwhelming evidence.  The system is set up to protect itself, and the legal representatives, who are often watching each other’s back more than they are protecting the public.  I don’t know exactly how to do it, but the first step is in recognizing where the problem lies.  Only then can the issue be addressed, and hopefully one day fixed.