Is Making a Murderer Biased?

This article contains spoilers about the content of Making a Murderer, so if you haven't yet seen the series and don't want the ending spoiled, read no further.

The Netflix original series Making a Murderer tells a compelling story about a man wrongly convicted of a crime he didn't commit and then convicted again for another crime on the strength of seemingly flimsy evidence. The prosecutor involved in the second trial, however, claims that the series omits crucial parts of the story in order to make the accused, Steven Avery, look less like a killer.

The series casts Avery as the victim of over-confident law-enforcement officials, an apparently false confession and possibly planted physical evidence, all of it designed to win the conviction of a man against whom the local police bore an endless grudge. The evidence as presented in the series looks so strong in Avery's favor that thousands of viewers have joined in online campaigns to encourage officials to re-open the case. But the case's original prosecutor argues that the series' producers have manipulated the facts to make Avery look less guilty.

In an email to TheWrap, former prosecutor Ken Kratz lays out several pieces of evidence that were presented during the trial but that were not included in the Netflix series. While some of that evidence is not much more conclusive than that included in the series, a few details raise some serious questions about the possibility that Avery stalked and trapped the woman he was accused of murdering. Kratz contends that the omission of this evidence shows a clear bias on the part of the filmmakers in favor of Avery's defense.

The continued controversy may or may not change the opinions of viewers, but it will certainly not hurt the popularity of the series, which has been one of the most talked-about TV events of the holiday season.