In the latest legal back and forth between the state of Wisconsin and Steven Avery’s wrongful conviction lawyer, Kathleen Zellner, the Inquisitr reports Zellner’s request to DNA test mystery bones found in a Manitowoc gravel pit was denied by a state appeals court. Or at least that’s how many outsiders watching the case interpreted the ruling. According to Zellner, the difference between that and what really went down was subtle but important.
“The Appellate Court did not deny the bone testing, they denied our request to remand [the case] to the Circuit Court … to allow the bones to be tested,” Zellner told Rolling Stone . “The Appellate Court did not want to add a new issue of bone testing.”
As the Inquisitr has noted, it’s still possible for the bones to be tested should incoming Attorney General Josh Kaul decide to reverse the state’s opposition to the testing and strike a deal with Avery’s legal team. That’s a route Zellner has been pushing hard for on social media, although she sounds ready to continue filing requests through the court too should cooperation not be forthcoming.
“Steven Avery’s fight for freedom is never going to end,” she tweeted on January 1. “Every new DNA test, new witness, new case just fuels the effort. We’ll create the biggest court record in America if necessary to free him. Just warming up for 2019.”
Motion filed w/Appellate Court for New DNA testing. ? @lifeafterten ? ? @michellemalkin ? ? @Newsweek ? #ScienceRules #WreckingCrew #MakingAMurderer2 #NoStoneLeftUnturned pic.twitter.com/GvKNsnhpRE
— Kathleen Zellner (@ZellnerLaw) December 17, 2018
Zellner told Rolling Stone that she was already preparing a new motion.
“We will be filing another motion with the appellate court on new evidence we have discovered as a result of our request to test the bones.”
The burned bone fragments in question come from a gravel pit near the Avery Salvage Yard and were so damaged that DNA testing was impossible during Steven Avery’s original trial for the murder of Teresa Halbach in 2006. Zellner wants to turn those remains over to Dr. Richard Selden, who pioneered a new rapid DNA testing procedure in June of 2018 that should not only be able to identify if the bones belong to Halbach, but could potentially even pick up DNA left by the killer if the bones were handled without gloves.
“We discovered there were 3 bone piles in Manitowoc County gravel pit, not just one,” Zellner tweeted at the time of her December 17 motion to test. “And they all have human bone in them.”
“The way it works on post-conviction is we refute validity of evidence the jury HEARD and SAW,” she added . “The Avery jury neither HEARD nor SAW anything regarding why multiple human bones in Manitowoc gravel pit. Too late to now spin new stories.”