Wisconsin governor Scott Walker will not pardon ‘Making a Murderer’ convict Steven Avery

Wisconsin governor, Scott Walker, will not pardon a man convicted with his nephew of murder, in a case dramatised in the television documentary, Making a Murderer, despite online petitions seeking their release, his office said.

Walker has not watched the Netflix documentary examining the case for Steven Avery’s innocence, in what is arguably the most infamous murder case in Wisconsin’s history.

Avery and his nephew, Brendan Dassey, are serving life sentences for the 2005 killing of freelance photographer, Teresa Halbach, who was found outside Avery’s home in Manitowoc County, Wisconsin.

Walker, a former Republican presidential candidate, has not been swayed by 300,000 signatures on online petitions at the Change.org website, calling for Avery’s exoneration, Walker spokeswoman, Laurel Patrick, said.

“Those who feel they have been wrongly convicted can seek to have their convictions overturned by a higher court,” she said.

A Whitehouse.gov petition, asking President Barack Obama to pardon the men, has received 113,000 signatures, which is more than the 100,000 needed for the administration to comment on the request.

However, the president does not have the authority to issue pardons on state cases.

Only Walker, who has not issued a pardon since his election in 2010, has that power.

“Steven Avery should be exonerated at once by pardon, and the Manitowoc County officials complicit in his two false imprisonments should be held accountable to the highest extent of the US criminal and civil justice systems,” the Change.org petition states, addressing Mr Obama and Mr Walker.

The 10-episode documentary, Making a Murderer, on the Netflix streaming service, questioned the handling of the case and the motivation of Manitowoc County law enforcement officials.

Avery was convicted of an unrelated rape and sent to prison in 1985, serving 18 years before DNA evidence exonerated him.

He filed a $36m (€33m) federal civil rights lawsuit against the county, and its former sheriff and district attorney, in 2004.

That case was settled in 2006, for $400,000, according to online court documents.

A year after he filed the lawsuit, Avery and Dassey were accused of killing Halbach. They were convicted in 2007 and sentenced to life in prison.

The documentary suggests authorities planted evidence against the men, a claim that has been rejected by Robert Hermann, the current sheriff of Manitowoc County, which is about 80 miles (130 km) north of Milwaukee.

Walker said: “Just because a documentary on TV says something doesn’t mean that’s actually what the evidence shows,” he told WQOW television.

“The bottom line is that there was a crime that was committed a decade ago.

“There is a system... by which individuals can petition the courts to get relief, like others have done in the past, that shows that someone might actually be innocent.

“But I am not going to over-ride a system that is already put in place.”