ABC News legal analyst Dan Abrams says he believes Brendan Dassey should be released from a Wisconsin prison following a federal appeals court opinion affirming that Dassey's confession to the murder of Teresa Halbach was coerced by Manitowoc County investigators.
Dassey, along with his uncle, Steven Avery, have been in prison for the past 10 years after they were convicted of killing freelance photographer, Teresa Halbach.
In 2016, Judge William Duffin ordered he be free immediately after finding investigators in the 2007 trial made "repeated false promises" false promises to Dassey by assuring him "he had nothing to worry about".
The three-judge panel from the court of appeals ruled on Thursday that the lower court's decision was correct, almost a year after the original decision.
The case caught the public's imagination in Netflix's documentary series Making a Murderer.
"We look forward to working to secure his release from prison as soon as possible", they said.
He concluded that, "when considered in conjunction with all relevant factors, most especially Dassey's age, intellectual deficits and the absence of a supportive adult, rendered Dassey's confession involuntary".
In his petition for release, Dassey argued that his attorney had a conflict of interest in the case.
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The death of Halbach and the conviction of Avery and Dassey placed Manitowoc County in the national spotlight.
Dassey was 16 at the time of the interview and wasn't accompanied by a lawyer or parent. A three-judge panel issued its ruling Thursday. Dassey's attorney, on the other hand, called it a "victory". In another version, Dassey told detectives that he heard screaming from his uncle's house as he brought him his mail.
"While these tactics might not have overwhelmed a seasoned criminal or a 30-year-old with a law degree, they clearly overwhelmed a 16-year-old, socially avoidant, intellectually limited [youth] who had never been interrogated by the police before", he said.
Speaking on WTMJ-AM Friday, Brad Schimel says the state will have a better chance of reversing the decision with a full and "balanced" court. For now, he will remain in jail, pending the Wisconsin Department of Justice's next move.
"We continue to send our condolences to the Halbach family, as they have to suffer through another attempt by Mr. Dassey to re-litigate his guilty verdict and sentence", he added. Ken Kratz, the prosecutor, wrote in his book Avery that Dassey was "a shuffling, mumbling young man with bad skin and broken-bowl haircut" who could have saved Halbach's life but instead involved himself in her rape and murder and Avery is "by any measure of the evidence, stone guilty".
The court described the method used to get Dassey to confess as "death by a thousand cuts", with judge David Hamilton saying the decision "breaks new ground and poses troubling questions for police and prosecutors".
"The supporters of Steven Avery want to lump them together and say 'ah ha! see!"
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