Adnan Syed is released!

[Squisita]

Adnan Syed was yesterday released from jail, after a judge ruled that the state violated its obligation to share evidence with the defence that would have helped his case.

Having listened to the Serial podcast about the case, I think this was the right decision and it's come 22 years too late. Based on the evidence, Adnan should have been acquitted.

I hope this now opens the path to finding Hae Min Lee's real killer.

I wouldn't say it was mental gymnastics at all. Why is Adnan a good "story" it's the most typical outcome there is, the most boring outcome really, the spurned ex did it, it's usually the current or ex partner when a woman is murdered

I think Jay as the killer makes sense in more ways than it being Adnan.

It's Jay who has the violent history (beating up a girlfriend, assaulting a police officer), Jay who was the drug dealer, and Jay who knew where the car was and admitted seeing Hae's body.

It's the motive that's missing so far.

I didn’t say ‘adnan as a suspect’ was a good story. Weren’t we discussing Bilal? <confused>

though as you’ve mentioned it I do think the ‘17 year old spurned Muslim lover’ narrative would have found traction in the 1990s

Yes I think that’s a good point and exactly why ‘Bilal covering abuse’ and ‘Adnan as the spurned lover’ theories do gain traction.
we like having a motive and answering the ‘why’.

I think accepting that men sometime just kill women cos ‘misogyny’ makes it unpredictable and uncomfortable to accept

Oh sorry, I misunderstood what you were saying there.

There are a lot of possibilities in the case I think, I do hope it's properly solved with the new investigation and Hae's family get some justice (if it wasn't Adnan)

Jay without Adnan is a possibility. I think though to go down that route you need to decide if this crime was:

a) pre-meditated so that Jay planned to set Adnan up and have Adnan’s car and phone that day. In which case, is Jay really that clever, and what possible motive could there be? I know notice isn’t an essential element of a crime but it would be odd for there to be a meticulously planned murder/framing for no reason at all.

b) their meeting came about by happenstance, or by coincidence Jay was meeting Hae in secret that day with no intention to kill her, but matters escalated. In which case he would have had to have got very very lucky that he happened to have Adnan’s car, Adnan’s phone and that third parties would claim that Adnan asked her for a ride after school that particular day.

plus, if he was the killer then he would have known the timeline and made it more plausible.

I don’t discount Jay, but if Jay is involved I think it is more likely than not that Adnan is too.

This isn't actually a reflection of Adnans guilt or innocence really. This is because the justice system is broken. The state prosecutor should have legally turned over all information to help the defences case and they didn't. That to me shows they were determined to get a conviction and willing to take that risk to get it.

Sadly, what that basically shows is that if the state prosecution decide your guilty and decide they absolutely must get a conviction it's highly likely that will happen to you. Regardless of your defence. How is that a justice system?

a) pre-meditated so that Jay planned to set Adnan up and have Adnan’s car and phone that day. In which case, is Jay really that clever, and what possible motive could there be? I know notice isn’t an essential element of a crime but it would be odd for there to be a meticulously planned murder/framing for no reason at all.

well at least two witnesses are recorded by the prosectutuon as saying that one off the alternate suspects threatened to kill Hae and had the motive and opportunity to do so. Dunno if Jay is that alternate suspect or not, but if he is, that would line up. I’m not sure you have to be super-smart to ask to borrow a car 🤷‍♀️

as to motive - I think that’s exactly why Jay is a constantly overlooked suspect. There’s no obvious motive, no clear story and people like an explanation. It couldn’t just be as previously discussed In this thread that he was jealous/disliked Hae or that something escalated with her.

I reckon they rely on your logic to make them seem innocent tbh.
Plus they probably can’t help themselves, they need to be involved, need to keep skirting the line as it thrills them.

It isn’t just borrowing a car. A criticism of the evidence against Adnan is that it’s all circumstantial, which is it is - but you have to acknowledge there is a fair bit of circumstantial evidence. If it was Jay and he has tried to frame Adnan, he is either very bright or very lucky to have got that evidence in place against Adnan.

Plus Nisha said she heard them together on that call, so whatever Jay was doing there was evidence Adnan was with him.

@Cantanka
Plus Nisha said she heard them together on that call, so whatever Jay was doing there was evidence Adnan was with him.

you keep saying this - do you have a link or anything?
my understanding is the Nisha call on the 13th is widely viewed as a pocket dial

Nisha did say she heard Adnan and Jay together, but that they were in the video store where Jay worked. He didn’t start that job until several weeks after Hae’s murder, so the likelihood is that Nisha, like Stephanie is mixing up dates.

Adnan and Jay could not be together in the video store where Jay worked, on January 13th, because Jay did not work there then. Do either Nisha’s recollection if the situation is false (she’s adamant it isn’t) or her recollection of the date is (she’s not certain about this).

lawprofessors.typepad.com/evidenceprof/2016/03/yesterday-a-reader-sent-me-an-e-mail-regarding-nishas-testimony-at-the-first-trial.html

here’s a good timeline of exactly how the Nisha call could fit in to Jay’s timeline:

viewfromll2.com/2014/12/13/serial-why-the-nisha-call-shows-that-hae-was-murdered-at-332-p-m/

A criticism of the evidence against Adnan is that it’s all circumstantial, which is it is - but you have to acknowledge there is a fair bit of circumstantial evidence.

genuine question, what is that circumstantial evidence?

circumstantial evidence is definitely evidence. I’m honestly struggling to think of any that can be used to construct a meaningful case against Adnan though.

I think things that don’t help Adnan:

— he bought a mobile phone the day before Hae’s murder and lent it to Jay the day of the murder. (Having said that, he seems to have called most of his friends to give them his number so it’s not like the mobile was a secret)

— that he was hanging around with Jay at least some of that day

— that Nisha says she spoke to Adnan and Jay that day, even though she could be wrong because Jay hadn’t started working at the video shop then

— the note from Hae which has ‘I’m going to kill’ scrawled in it (although I’m not sure who wrote that)?

— that he didn’t try to call Hae’s house after the day she died (but this can be explained because her friends all knew she was missing so no point in calling Hae’s house , especially as her family was strict about no boyfriends)

— Jay’s shifting, unreliable testimony

The above seems to be the extent of the ‘circumstantial’ evidence against Adnan.

Is it enough to convict someone? I don’t think so.

Agree with a few clarifications:

Adnan didn’t lend Jay his phone. He just left it in the car as he wasn’t allowed it in class.

agree re: Nisha call but the conflicting location/timeline makes that unreliable

Note: no author ascribed

Not calling her after: seems not unusual if we accept they didn’t have a pattern of speaking regularly on the phone and it was reasonable for Don her actual boyfriend who heard no updates via her schoolmates to ever call her.

so in summary it seems the main ‘evidence’ for Adnan’s guilt is, as always, Jay - Who knew where the car was and has a history of violence against women.

which leads me back to my previous point that it’s interesting that he’s never been a suspect in his own right. I honestly wonder why.

Why would Jay have done it? That seems a bit out there, he barely even knew Hae Min. Strangulation is personal and impassioned.

Dunno. And I think that’s exactly why he’s been overlooked as a suspect. No clear ‘motive/story’.
why has he committed violence against women through his lifetime? 🤷‍♀️

why would Mr S or Bilal have done it?

Unfortunately some men just hate women and have really short fuses. I appreciate that’s a less appetising narrative but it’s true.

not all killings have a ‘reason’ a lot of violence is senseless.

you keep saying this - do you have a link or anything? my understanding is the Nisha call on the 13th is widely viewed as a pocket dial.
Nisha did say she heard Adnan and Jay together, but that they were in the video store where Jay worked. He didn’t start that job until several weeks after Hae’s murder, so the likelihood is that Nisha, like Stephanie is mixing up dates

I hope this link works!

m.box.com/shared_item/https%3A%2F%2Fapp.box.com%2Fs%2Fq1i4ad1s8ax9nmirrexmo0brl4ovjglx

This is her first interview, as far as I can tell, about the call. By the time she gives evidence, much time has passed, she’s been interviewed numerous times (by Adnan’s PI amongst bothers). Recollections fade, and her recollection was most likely to be accurate at the early stage.

I think a pocket call is unlikely. Not impossible - but unlikely. It lasted 2 minutes 22 seconds. Either someone answered (and stayed on the line 2 minutes 22), or it just rang out. Nisha said she didn’t have a voicemail. My recollection is there was evidence at trial that AT&T only charged for calls that were answered.

The problem for Adnan is that we know Jay had the phone that day, and Jay didn’t know Nisha, so the only reason for the call to be intentionally placed is if Jay is with Adnan. So Adnan has to claim a pocket call.

I know Adnan’s supporters say it was a pocket dial, because they have to. Because if it wasn’t, it places him with Jay, off campus, at 3:32pm in contradiction of his claim he was on campus till 5pm. Interestingly, until Adnan knew the location could be traced to off campus, he seemed to want to use it as an alibi, and his PI (Drew Davis) drove quite some way to interview Nisha about this, 104 miles. He met with her on 8/3/99, the first witness he visited having been instructed on 4/3/99. They thought she was going to be important - till they got the location data!

If he has already killed Hae and wants an alibi, then yeah why not call someone and say you’re at a store with someone else by way of alibi? Bit odd that he put Jay on the phone to Nisha for no discernible reason unless to prove the point he wasn’t alone? This is all happening when he doesn’t know Jay is going to turn on him, or that the police can obtain cell phone location data. I think this is just as plausible as the suggestion of a 2.5 minute pocket dial.

I don’t think it is “widely accepted” it was a pocket call at all. I think that’s a point of contention. I do agree Nisha’s evidence on the point has become less sure over time so I’m not saying it proves anything conclusively because she could be mistaken. But a pocket call is unlikely in my opinion, and if it wasn’t a pocket call, it is evidence adverse to Adnan’s innocence because it means he is with Jay, somewhere other than where he claimed to be.

So to be clear I’m not saying I think Adnan Syed should be convicted based on this, or that the picture regarding the call is clear, but I don’t agree it’s as simple as you say that there is just no evidence at all against him. I again find the nisha call at best odd, and at worst very suspicious. I have set out my reasons for not being persuaded that this evidence can be dismissed as nothing.

This is her first interview, as far as I can tell, about the call. By the time she gives evidence, much time has passed, she’s been interviewed numerous times (by Adnan’s PI amongst bothers). Recollections fade, and her recollection was most likely to be accurate at the early stage.

well if that’s her first interview, she clearly states that she spoke to Adnan and Jay when had just gotten to Jay’s store.

jay didn’t start work at the store till january 24th - over a week after Hae went missing.

that interview seems to clearly put her recollection of the call with Adnan and Jay on a different day entirely 🤷‍♀️

Where is Jay's grandmother's house in relation to the car dump? The wording of the motion states the car dump was near a suspects relatives house and that the suspect was living there in 1999.

@FurAndFeathers Indeed that's true, but I suppose what I'm having trouble envisaging is that a man Hae barely knew got close enough to strangle her without getting his DNA on her body - she didn't scratch him or punch him, etc - there was no DNA on the body at all, Adnan's or anyone else's. Which leads me back to the belief that Hae knew and trusted her killer.

She also says other stuff to suggest it was then like shortly after her got his phone, plus the point if it was intended as an alibi which seems to have been Adnan’s initial
position. Also it doesn’t matter if she misremembers which conversation it was. We know Jay had the phone as he made most of the calls. So even if she only spoke to Adnan, it still puts him with Jay that afternoon.

I err on the side of probable guilt but I am ultimately open minded about this case as I’ve said numerous times but you seem totally resistant to any suggestion there could be anything whatsoever to implicate Adnan Syed in this crime.

@FurAndFeathers I'm currently listening to Undisclosed to refresh the case in my mind and am really taking on board the points you make and I think maybe you're right. I do also think though that there was massive Police interference and foul play on their part. You're right though, men hurt women, men kill women all the time for little to very trivial reasons. It's certainly a good point to remember when looking for good motive in cases like these, sometimes there just isn't any.

Does anyone know though how or why Jay started telling the Police the story about Adnan doing it? Is it just the Police questioned him and he admitted it and that was that? Seems odd still that if Jay did do it that he wouldn't lie completely about the situation instead of just coming out and admitting to being involved (even just as an accessory to burying the body, that's still a very serious crime)

no, It puts him with Jay a week later (a week is shortly after he got the phone) at the video store where Jay worked (as that’s what she clearly states)

Nowhere does Nisha say that she spoke to Adnan that afternoon, and she is very clear it’s at the store where Jay worked, so no, this call does not place Adnan and Jay together on January 13th

And I’m not resistant to it. I have no idea who committed this crime. But I’m also not going to claim that the evidence ‘proves’ things that it doesn’t

No one really knows. If I recall correctly there were approx 3 hours of ‘interview’ with Jay prior to the police recording starting and no one knows what was discussed in that time.