Laurentian University forensic anthropologist Scott Fairgrieve has been an expert witness in a fair number of high-profile murder cases throughout his career, but the 2007 trial of Steven Avery, profiled in the hit Netflix documentary series “Making a Murderer,” still raises a number of questions almost nine years later.
“It didn't make sense to me,” Fairgrieve said. “And I'm sure it didn't make sense to the defence team.”
What didn't make sense was that Steve Avery, of Manitowoc County, Wisconsin, had become the primary suspect in the murder of photographer Teresa Hallbach.
Police found Halbach's burned remains on Avery's property in 2005, only two years after he had been acquitted of a violent rape he did not commit. He spent 18 years in prison before DNA evidence proved he was not guilty of that crime.
When Avery was charged for Halbach's murder, he was in the midst of a $36-million lawsuit against the county for his wrongful arrest and conviction, that Fairgrieve said seemed like a sure bet.
“I wouldn't want to be even running stop signs in that town if I was him,” Fairgrieve said.
When Avery's case went to trial in 2007, his lawyers asked Fairgrieve to testify as an expert witness.
Earlier that year, he had published a book entitled “Forensic Cremation Analysis” that was published by CRC Press in the United States.
“They did a little homework on who actually looks at stuff like this, and they found me,” Fairgrieve said.
Avery's defence attorneys – Dean Strang and Jerry Buting – asked Fairgrieve to provide them with his expert analysis of the cases's forensic anthropology report, which included images of Halbach's charred remains on Avery's property.
Fairgrieve was later asked to share his expert opinion in court, where he said he agreed with 85 per cent of the forensic anthropology report's findings, prepared by forensic anthropologist Leslie Eisenberg.
But Fairgrieve said it was possible Halbach's remains were moved to Avery's property, after they were burned at another site.
He bases that opinion on how police handled the site of the remains — poorly, said Fairgrieve. So poorly, he said it was impossible to determine with certainty where Halbach's remains were cremated.
“There is a process to follow,” he said. “It's much like digging an archaeological site. It, in fact, uses many of the same techniques. But in this case those techniques were not used.
“In the time I've been working with police in Ontario, I certainly have never seen a site handled like that. I've never come across anything where a scene has been handled like that.”
Fairgrieve said police did not have a forensic anthropologist at the scene to supervise the careful handling of the evidence – burned human remains in this case.
“I believe it was because she (Eisenberg) wasn't available at the time, but subsequently became available to look at the remains and help with the sorting of the materials. If you've got remains there, my feeling would be, 'Sit on this until you get the actual help you need in order to do it properly.' That's what we do (in Ontario).”
The Netflix documentary, released in December, questioned the prosecution's view that Avery was guilty of Halbach's murder.
Warning: “Making a Murderer” spoilers below
In addition to the poor handling of the evidence, Fairgrieve said the case, and the documentary, highlighted many other inconsistencies that should have cast doubt on Avery's eventual guilty verdict.
One other example, said Fairgrieve, was that police had a vial of Avery's blood in their possession that had been tainted, due to a broken seal and a puncture mark at the top of the tube.
“There are a lot of bizarre aspects to this case,” Fairgrieve said.
Due to a number of inconsistencies, Fairgrieve said a higher court in the United States should examine how the prosecution handled Avery's case.
“I think they've exhausted everything they can do in Wisconsin,” he said.
If all state options have been exhausted, only the Supreme Court of the United States could re-examine the case.
