Doug Schneider

USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin

ASHWAUBENON - Lawyers for Steven Avery seriously considered seeking a change of venue at his trial on charges arising from the 2005 murder of Teresa Halbach but decided against it after pretrial statements made by special prosecutor Ken Kratz garnered statewide media coverage, it was revealed Friday.

Dean Strang made the comment Friday during an appearance before about 110 fellow lawyers at the Wisconsin Association for Justice Spring Seminar at the Radisson Hotel & Conference Center. Strang was joined by Walt Kelly, an attorney who represented Avery in his $36 million wrongful-conviction lawsuit against Manitowoc County stemming from a 1985 rape along Lake Michigan near Two Rivers.

Strang's explanation on the change of venue issue answers one of the most perplexing questions on the minds of people who have followed "Making a Murderer,"' the 10-part Netflix docu-series that focuses on Avery's trial and conviction in the murder of Halbach in Manitowoc County.

Hopes of moving the trial to an outside county were dashed when Kratz, at a press conference, detailed grisly allegations against Avery that were reported in every media market in Wisconsin, Strang said. The details, later debunked, were from statements to police from Avery's teenage nephew, Brendan Dassey.

Kratz presented "a compelling, graphic, gruesome admission of guilt, laying out a confession that a 16-year-old had given implicating his uncle," Strang said. "There was not one of the 71 other counties in Wisconsin that we could have gone to to get (an impartial) jury. ... It was pointless to try to go to another county to get a jury."

Instead of seeking a jury from another county, Strang and co-counsel Jerry Buting were allowed to try the case in Calumet County before a jury of Manitowoc County residents. Strang said the lawyers hoped that would keep bailiffs and other Manitowoc County personnel from having any contact with jurors, and that their case might be aided by jurors who were familiar with the sheriff's department's long dislike of Avery.

Avery was convicted of first-degree intentional homicide and is serving life in prison with no possibility of parole. He is in the process of appealing the conviction.

In a separate trial, Dassey was also convicted of homicide and is serving life in prison.

Avery's lawyers, particularly Strang and Buting, have been in demand as speakers since the documentary began airing in December. The pair began a North American speaking tour this week. Their compassion for victims and clients has resonated with audiences, and magazines like Vogue and Elle have written that Strang is particularly popular with women.

Friday's presentation to the Wisconsin Association of Justice marked the first time either Strang or Buting have spoken in northeast or east-central Wisconsin since the documentary sparked such widespread interest. Strang was expected to join Buting in Milwaukee later Friday to partake in a panel discussion justice.

Strang said several times during Friday's Ashwaubenon presentation that he had “lost the case,” prompting an attorney in the audience, Monica Cail of Milwaukee, to say that it had been a win “because you started a national conversation about justice.”

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Kelly, meanwhile, said authorities in Manitowoc County stacked the deck against Avery, beginning with their investigation of the July 29, 1985, rape of a woman who had been jogging along the Lake Michigan shoreline.

“By midnight of the 29th of July in 1985, Steven Avery was basically on his way to prison,” said Kelly. “They had an Avery and they were considered a bad bunch in Manitowoc, and Avery at age 23 was developing as the worst of them.”

Kelly eventually settled Avery’s suit for $400,000 so that Avery could afford to hire attorneys to defend him in Halbach’s murder case.

dschneid@greenbaypressgazette.com and follow him on Twitter @PGDougSchneider