The case introduced in Netflix's series Making a Murderer featuring Steven Avery is confusing, to say the least. When you think you have a grasp on what's going on, evidence throws you in a different direction. It makes great TV, but it's really frustrating. At one point in his life, Steven Avery was a relatively normal guy. He had a wife and five children, and was living a "good life," he says in the trailer for Making a Murderer, until the trouble started. Once he was wrongly convicted of sexual assault, his "good life" started to crumble, and so did his family. But, was there any type of family reconnection after his release for Making a Murderer 's subject, Steven Avery and his children?
According to the first episode of Making a Murderer, after Avery and his wife, Lori Mathiesen, divorced while he was imprisoned for rape, she and his children were taken off the visitation list to see their father in prison. His kids, Rachel, Jenny, Steven Jr., William, and Jason (Lori's son from a previous relationship) seemed to separate themselves from Avery, which isn't the most absurd thing to do in the situation they were in.
An article from Post Crescent reveals Steven Avery's ex-wife is now married to Brendan Dassey's father (Brendan Dassey is Avery's nephew and was also convicted of the Teresa Halbach murder). And the article reports that the children, who are now grown adults, have little contact with their father. "four or five [of the children] have said Avery should not have been let out of prison [the first time]," the article reads.
The resurfacing of Avery's case in this Netflix documentary cannot be an easy thing to have to deal with for his children. They've already lived through the conviction, exoneration, and second conviction of their father, and it's not crazy to think they'll face a lot of attention this time around, too. Hopefully, they are able to be as involved or removed from the media-frenzy as they want to be, and can continue to live their lives however they see fit.
Images: Netflix (2)
