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Could Swedish blood test solve ‘Making a Murderer’?

Researchers at Sweden’s Karolinska Institutet (KI) medical university are hoping to use blood tests to solve an American murder case which gained global fame in a Netflix documentary.

Published: 17 October 2016 08:13 CEST

Could Swedish blood test solve 'Making a Murderer'?

Steven Avery (right) was sentenced to life in prison in 2007. Photo: Dwight Nale/AP

The documentary series ‘Making a Murderer’ looks at the story of Steven Avery, who is currently serving a life prison sentence for the murder of photographer Teresa Halbach in Wisconsin. He maintains that he is innocent.

Now, researchers at KI will carry out tests of the blood trail used as evidence in the case, which should help show whether he was correctly convicted or not.

KI senior researcher in molecular biology Kirsty Spalding watched the Netflix series when it aired in 2015. When she realized that Avery had been imprisoned without proper testing of the blood evidence being carried out, she contacted his lawyer, Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet (SvD) reports.

“I e-mailed her to say ‘I believe we can determine with radioactive carbon-dating whether the blood was planted or not’. I received a reply within half an hour,” Spalding told SvD.

In the series, the documentary makers argue that Avery was wrongly convicted, and that local police and prosecutors may have planted his blood in 25-year-old photographer Halbach’s vehicle.

Avery, 54, had previously been acquitted in 2003 of the 1985 rape and attempted murder of Penny Beerntsen, for which he served 18 years in prison.

But in November 2005 he was arrested again, this time on suspicion of murder in a new case. Two years later he was sentenced to life imprisonment for the killing of photographer Halbach.

The practice that makes the new blood test possible is radiocarbon dating. The large increase in radioactive carbon in relation to non-radioactive carbon can be used as a timeline which is helpful when dating for example human tissue.

“I thought we could measure the level of radioactive carbon in relation to normal carbon and from there know whether the blood from Steven Avery’s conviction is from 1996, or from the murder of Teresa Halbach which was sentenced in 2005,” Spalding said.

If the blood is old, it could be a sign that it was planted. When the test will be performed is not yet known.

EXPLAINED: What we know about the attack on a Swedish anti-fascist meeting

What happened?

Several masked men burst into a Stockholm theatre on Wednesday night and set off smoke bombs during an anti-fascism event, according to police and participants.

Around 50 people were taking part in the event at the Moment theatre in Gubbängen, a southern suburb of the Swedish capital, organised by the Left Party and the Green Party.

“Three people were taken by ambulance to hospital,” the police said on its website, shortly after the attack.

According to Swedish media, one person was physically assaulted and two had paint sprayed in their faces.

“The Nazis attacked visitors using physical violence, with pepper spray, and vandalised the venue before throwing in some kind of smoke grenade which filled the foyer with smoke,” Expo wrote on its website.

The magazine’s head of education Klara Ljungberg was at the event in order to hold a lecture at the invitation of the two political parties.

What was the meeting about?

According to the Left Party’s press officer, the event was “a meeting about growing fascism”.

Left Party leader Nooshi Dadgostar described the event to public broadcaster SVT as an “open event, for equality among individuals”.

As well as Ljungberg from Expo, panelists at the event included anti-fascist activist Mathias Wåg, who also writes for Swedish centre-left tabloid Aftonbladet.

“They were determined and went straight for me,” Wåg told Expo just after the attack. “I received a few blows but nothing that caused serious damage.”

“I was invited to be on a panel in order to discuss anti-fascism with representatives from the Left Party and the Green Party,” he told the magazine. “I didn’t know this was going to happen, but there’s obviously a risk when Expo and I are in the same place.”

What has the reaction been like?

All of Sweden’s parties across the political spectrum have denounced the attack, with Dadgostar describing it as a “threat to our democracy” when TT newswire interviewed her at the theatre a few hours after the attack occurred.

Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson, from the conservative Moderates, called the attack “abhorrent”.

The Moderates, Christian Democrats and Liberals are currently in government with the support of the far-right Sweden Democrats, while the Social Democrats, Left Party, Centre Party and Green Party are in opposition.

“It is appalling news that a meeting hosted by the Left Party has been stormed,” Kristersson told TT. “I have reached out to Nooshi Dadgostar and expressed my deepest support. This type of abhorrent action has no place in our free and open society.”

“Right-wing extremists want to scare us into silence,” Social Democrat leader Magdalena Andersson wrote on X. “They will never be allowed to succeed.”

“The attack by right-wing extremists at a political meeting is a direct attack on our democracy and freedom of speech,” Green Party co-leader Daniel Helldén wrote on X. “My thoughts are with those who were affected this evening.”

Sweden Democrat party leader Jimmie Åkesson wrote in an email to TT that “political violence is terrible, in all its forms, and does not belong in Sweden.”

“All democratic forces must stand in complete solidarity against all kinds of politically motivated violence,” he continued.

His party has previously admitted to being founded by people from “fascist movement” New Swedish Movement, skinheads, and people with “various types of neo-Nazi contact”.

“It is an attack not only on the Left Party, Green Party and the Expo Foundation, but also on our entire democratic society,” Centre Party leader Muharrem Demirok, who referred to the attackers as “Nazis”, wrote on social media. “Those affected have all my support.”

Christian Democrat leader Ebba Busch and Liberal leader Johan Pehrson both referred to the attackers as “anti-democratic forces”.

“It is never acceptable for a political meeting to be stormed by anti-democratic forces,” Busch wrote. “There is no place for this in our society.”

“Anti-democratic forces like this represent a serious threat to our democracy and must be met with society’s hardest iron fist,” Pehrson said.

What about the attackers? Has anyone been arrested?

Not yet. The police had not made any arrests at the time of writing on Thursday morning.

According to TT, police did not want to comment on who could be behind the attack.

It is currently being investigated as a violation of the Flammable and Explosive Goods Act, assault, causing danger to others and disturbing public order.

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