The 18 September 2017 meeting was a meeting between Steven Avery’s attorneys Kathleen Zellner and Douglas Johnson and the State's representatives Assistant Attorney General Thomas Fallon and prosecutors Norman Gahn and Mark Williams. The meeting took place in Madison, Wisconsin. During the meeting the two parties agreed that additional pieces of evidence would be made available to Zellner and that she could amend her postconviction motion, filed in June 2017, with the results.
However, in the weeks following the meeting Zellner never informed the circuit court that she had intentions of amending the motion that she had already filed with them roughly three months prior to the meeting. As such, the circuit court remained unaware of the meeting and the agreements made between the two parties. In October 2017 the circuit court, still unaware of the meeting, denied Zellner's postconviction motion.
Zellner said she had the intention to inform the circuit court, but she didn't until after the ruling.
The evidence[]
The evidence that the State agreed to make available.
| # | ID | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Item A | Toyota RAV4 |
| 2 | Item IE | Swab of the RAV4 battery cable |
| 3 | Item IF | Swab of the RAV4 battery cable |
| 4 | Item AJ | RAV4 license plate |
| 5 | Item AK | RAV4 license plate |
| 6 | Item A16 | lug wrench recovered from RAV4 |
| 7 | Property tag 8675 | Pelvis bone |
Aside from making the above evidence available to Zellner, the following specifics with regards to the availability of the evidence was also agreed upon:
- Take swabs from the bar under the driver's seat of the RAV4;
- Take swabs from the hood crutch of the RAV4;
- Take swabs from the interior hood release of the RAV4;
- Do a complete examination of the interior and exterior of the RAV4 for additional forensic evidence;
- A microscopic examination of the pelvis bone by Zellner's expert Steven Symes and State's expert Leslie Eisenberg.
Other agreements[]
Besides allowing Zellner examinations and testing, the two parties also agreed that Zellner would remove the issues with regards to alleged ethical violations by Ken Kratz and the references to the brain fingerprinting from her Post-conviction Motion.
Timeline[]
- 7 June 2017: Zellner files her Motion for Post-conviction Relief.
- 18 September 2017: Zellner meets with State representatives.
- 3 October 2017: circuit court denies the Motion for Post-convction Relief.
- 6 October 2017: Zellner files a motion explaining she did intend to inform the court and asks the judge to reconsider her decision on the Motion for Post-convction Relief.
- 28 November 2017: the circuit court denies Zellner's request to relief.
- 28 July 2021: the Court of Appeals affirms the circuit court's decisions on both motions.