John Ferak

USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin

From the moment Teresa Halbach's disappearance made the news in 2005, a teary-eyed Steven Avery insisted that the Manitowoc County Sheriff's Office was again trying to railroad him. Avery had already lost 18 years of freedom because of a botched rape investigation.

Timeline: History of the Steven Avery case

But Avery's claims of innocence in Halbach's murder were brushed aside by police. Authorities swiftly arrested him after a pile of human bones were found in a burn pit on his property. By February 2007, Avery's defense attorneys, Jerry Buting and Dean Strang, made allegations of planted blood and fabricated evidence the central theme of the trial.

The strategy didn't work. Avery was convicted of first-degree intentional homicide and was sent to prison for life. But that didn't end speculation that evidence was planted in Avery's case. The release in December of 'Making a Murderer" sparked worldwide interest in the case — and prompted questions about other cases involving allegations of planted evidence.

Related: 'Making a Murderer' coverage, archived stories, more

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There is no national statistical data on cases involving police who plant evidence, said Jim McNamara, who retired in 2012 as supervisory special agent at the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit in Quantico, Virginia.

"It's a very rare occurrence but it only takes one or two bad ones to make everyone suspect," McNamara told USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin. "When it happens, it's magnified in the public arena including the media, the community and the public."

Some cops justify planting evidence because they believe the suspect is evil and needs to be locked away from society, said McNamara, a consultant at Behavioral Criminology International. Other crooked cops hold grudges against suspects for a variety of reasons, and still others rationalize that if a suspect didn't do this crime, they're bound to commit other ones.

"Doing the wrong thing for what you believe is the right thing is totally unnecessary," McNamara said. "There has got to be another way to make a case without planting evidence."

The USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin identified an array of cases involving evidence planting allegations that run the gamut. Some cases happened in major U.S. cities. Others occurred in America's Heartland. One still-developing case is in Kenosha.

Some cases led to criminal charges against the cops and, in some cases, prison time. One case led to the eventual reinstatement of one of the accused officers. In the case involving Avery, the two sheriff's investigators accused of planting evidence remained on their force. They were not subjected to any internal or external investigation surrounding their conduct.

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Who: Lt. James Lenk and Sgt. Andrew Colborn

Agency: Manitowoc County Sheriff's Office

Summary: In mid-October 2005, Lenk and Colborn's conduct was being called into question by Avery's civil attorneys during as part of a $36 million lawsuit against Manitowoc County over Avery's 18-year wrongful imprisonment case. About three weeks later, photographer Teresa Halbach of Calumet County vanished. On Nov. 3, Colborn recited the license plates, make and model of Halbach's missing vehicle over the police radio to one of his dispatchers. Two days later, Halbach's dark green vehicle — missing its front and back license plates — was found concealed under several broken tree limbs on the perimeter of the Avery Salvage Yard. At Avery's trial, Colborn denied he was standing at Halbach's vehicle when he made the call, but on the witness stand Colborn was unable to explain his precise whereabouts at the time he called into dispatch.

By the time the murder victim's SUV was impounded, Lenk and Colborn had already made multiple visits to the Avery Salvage Yard. When the vehicle was processed, small droplets of Avery's blood appeared near the key ignition. Avery's lawyers later discovered a box of unsecured evidence housed at the courthouse with a vial of Avery's blood. Lenk managed the evidence room for his agency and Lenk handled the box of Avery evidence back in 2002. "When you consider the forces, the emotions, the very human failings here, it's no surprise that the blood from that unsecured vial in the box in the clerk's office that Lt. Lenk examined back in 2002 ends up in that Toyota. Because that's where it ought to be," defense attorney Dean Strang argued at Avery's trial.

Just days before Avery's arrest, Colborn and Lenk returned to Avery's trailer home on Tuesday, Nov. 8. This time, Colborn and Lenk produced a spare key for Halbach's RAV4. The lone key was found on Avery's bedroom floor. A Calumet County investigator testified the key was not on the floor during previous searches and he acknowledged it could have been planted. The key contained the DNA of Avery but not Halbach.

By March 2006, authorities arrested 16-year-old Brendan Dassey as a co-conspirator. In need of hard evidence to corroborate the confession from Avery's nephew, a slew of investigators got another warrant to search Avery's garage for the second time in four months. This time, smashed bullet fragments containing Halbach's DNA were found near an air compressor. Lenk was back on the Avery property at the time the bullet fragments were found. In 2010, the sheriff's office named Lenk as Manitowoc County's officer of the year. He retired in December 2011 after 23 years in the department. Now in his mid-60s, Lenk resides in Green Valley, Arizona. Meanwhile, Colborn, 56, has since been promoted. Today, Colborn directs Manitowoc County's detective unit.

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Who: Kyle Baars, three-year veteran of Kenosha Police Department.

Agency: Kenosha Police Department

Summary: In April 2014, Kenosha police responded to a car that struck a house on Sheridan Road. Officers found Anthony Edwards slumped over the wheel, dead from a gunshot wound. Authorities determined that Edwards was slain during a drug deal robbery. Fresh footprints in the snow led police to a pair of the suspects including Markese K. Tibbs. Officer Kyle Baars took Tibbs into custody and drove him back to the police station. The next night, Baars joined other officers during a search warrant at one of the suspects' apartments. At first, Baars claimed he found Tibbs' ID card and a .22-caliber bullet inside a blue backpack found inside the bedroom. A pair of suspects pleaded guilty in connection with the homicide. However, Baars later testified in court that he had in fact planted the bullet and ID card inside the backpack. Baars testified the .22-caliber bullet came from his own house. Baars also testified he took possession of Tibbs' ID card when he drove Tibbs to the police station. He planted the evidence to bolster his agency's case against Tibbs. Baars resigned from the Kenosha police force in January 2015 under the mistaken belief that he would not be subject to any criminal prosecution for planting the evidence. Baars' lawyer later argued that Kenosha Police Chief John Morrissey told Baars that his personnel file would list "personal reasons" as the reason of his departure and that Morrissey would not recommend criminal charges if Baars resigned from the force, which he did. Last May, Baars was charged in Kenosha County with misconduct in office, a felony, and obstructing an officer, a misdemeanor. The criminal case is set for an upcoming jury trial in April.

Source: The Kenosha News, The Journal Times, court records

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Who: Jeffrey Walker

Agency: Philadelphia Police Department narcotics squad

Summary: In July 2015, former Philadelphia narcotics officer Jeffrey Walker, 47, was sentenced to 3½ years in federal prison. Nicknamed "Batman" by notorious drug dealers, Walker later admitted that he had planted drugs at a South Philadelphia drug dealer's car in 2013 and then broke into the house to steal $15,000. Walker was twice divorced and had a drinking problem. Walker engaged in a pattern of criminal conduct ever since he joined the Philadelphia police force, a federal judge declared. "I have no excuses" Walker testified at his sentencing. Walker pleaded guilty to attempted robbery and using a gun during a violent crime. Under a plea bargain, Walker agreed to testify against six fellow narcotics officers as part of a sweeping federal police corruption probe. In 2015, a federal jury acquitted the six Philadelphia officers accused of committing fraud. The six acquitted officers won their jobs back along with back pay.

Source: Philadelphia Inquirer

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Who: Roderick Hashaway

Agency: Winnsboro Police Department (Texas)

Summary: In 2013, Texas police captain Roderick Hashaway pleaded guilty to planting evidence such as methamphetamine against suspects to make arrests in drugs cases. Other times, he provided drugs to confidential informants so they could plant the drugs underneath the driver's side seats of suspects being targeted by Hashaway during his drug investigations. Hashaway's crooked behavior came to light shorty after his east Texas department underwent a leadership change in September 2012. "It gave us a black eye. It gives all of law enforcement a black eye," Andy Chester, the police chief of Winnsboro, told KLTV. In 2014, Hashaway was sentenced to three years of probation, fined $4,000 and forced to surrender his police officer's license.

Source: Television station KLTV

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Who: David Kofoed

Agency: Douglas County Sheriff's Office (Nebraska)

Summary: In 2006, Nebraska crime lab commander David Kofoed purported to find a small trace of murder victim's blood underneath the driver's side dashboard of a suspected getaway car in a grisly farmhouse murder. The blood corroborated a false confession from a mentally challenged relative who implicated himself and another cousin even though no physical evidence at the extremely bloody crime scene had linked the two cousins to the shotgun slayings roughly 30 miles away. Later, DNA residue found on a drug pipe and an engraved ring dropped by the real killers excluded the Nebraska cousins. Instead, the DNA implicated two Horicon, Wisconsin teenagers who were on a cross-country crime spree. Ultimately, the Wisconsin killers pleaded guilty, and murder charges were dismissed against the Nebraska cousins. The FBI later determined that Kofoed used a blood-soaked shirt collected from one of the murder victims to frame the Nebraska cousins, not realizing at the time they were truly innocent. The FBI also uncovered another high-profile Nebraska murder case from 2003 in which Kofoed planted blood to frame someone who already confessed and later pleaded guilty to murdering a small child. In 2010, a Nebraska judge found Kofoed guilty of tampering with evidence in the pair of unrelated murder cases. Kofoed later served two full years in state prison. These days, he no longer works in law enforcement and now resides in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Source: Court records

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Who: Frank Platt, Kara Hindman

Agency: Omaha Police Department (Nebraska)

Summary: In May 2010, Omaha police chief Alex Hayes placed officers Kara Hindman and Frank Platt on paid administrative leave after a fellow officer reported Platt asked him to set aside a small amount of confiscated marijuana. The pot was supposed to be planted inside a trash can of a known gang member. It's common for narcotics officers to confiscate the trash of known drug users in hopes of finding probable cause to raid the suspect's home. At the time, Platt and Hindman were road patrol partners who were also dating. Platt had previously worked in the drug unit and Hindman was working in Omaha's gang unit. Once the internal affairs probe began, Platt, then 39, immediately retired, receiving a $40,000 per year police disability pension for post-traumatic stress disorder. Hindman remained on paid administrative leave from the department for 11 months. In April 2011, the criminal prosecutor's office announced it would not be filing criminal charges against any of the officers. Hindman was subsequently reinstated to the force.

Source: Omaha World-Herald

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Who: Ronald S. Taylor, Norman Brooks, homicide detectives, Lt. John Harlow

Agency: Washington District of Columbia

Summary: In 1981, police in Washington D.C. framed Donald E. Gates for the rape and murder of a 21-year-old Georgetown University co-ed. Gates was exonerated in 2009 through DNA testing after being wrongfully imprisoned for 27 years. In November 2015, a federal jury found the District of Columbia financially liable for damages. The original case against Gates was built largely on a fabricated confession that Gates supposedly made to a paid police informant. Other evidence pointing to Gates' innocence was withheld from his lawyers. Last November, the federal jury concluded that the two lead homicide detectives, Ronald S. Taylor and Norman Brooks, engaged in police misconduct during their investigation of Gates into the death of Catherine Schilling. A third codefendant, now-retired D.C. Lt. John Harlow, was acquitted by the jury. Brooks had worked in the homicide unit in D.C. for 17 years and now works security at the Federal Reserve Bank. Taylor retired from the D.C. force after 20 years and currently works in security for entertainers.

In 2012, DNA evidence linked the co-ed's killing to a now-deceased janitor who had worked inside the murder victim's apartment.

The District of Columbia agreed to pay Gates $16.65 million, marking the largest wrongful conviction settlement in the city's history. Gates, 64, told The Washington Post he was overjoyed by the settlement. "I’m hoping the message goes around the country: You can’t violate a black man or black woman’s civil rights, or no American citizen’s civil rights, anywhere. That’s what I hope."

Source: The Washington Post

John Ferak: 920-993-7115 or jferak@gannett.com; on Twitter@johnferak