Laura Ricciardi

Alongside creative and romantic partner Moira Demos, filmmaker Laura Ricciardi brought the American criminal justice system into question with the riveting ten-hour docuseries about the astonishing case of convicted killer Steven Avery, "Making a Murderer" (Netflix, 2015). A graduate of New York Law School, Ricciardi met Demos while studying Film at the Columbia University School of the Arts in 2005. Later that same year the pair read a New York Times article about Steven Avery, a Wisconsin man who had spent nearly two decades in jail following a wrongful sexual assault conviction, only to be charged with the murder of photographer Teresa Halbach just two years after his exoneration. Demos and Ricciardi temporarily relocated to Avery's Manitowoc County hometown to begin an investigative documentary about his impending trial, where they were granted unprecedented access to legal proceedings, Avery's family and the man himself. Just as the filmmakers were preparing to return to New York, the story then took a further twist when Avery's young nephew Brendan Dassey was also charged in relation to the same brutal crime. Ricciardi and Demos continued to follow the two trials, both of which resulted in convictions, and subsequently spent the next eight years editing their 700 hours' worth of related footage. Widely hailed as one of the most compelling true crime documentaries of all time, "Making a Murderer" (Netflix, 2015) immediately captivated audiences worldwide, and by shining a light on the questionable behaviour of the prosecution team, also sparked debate about the fairness of the American criminal justice system.