I listened to the whole series with an open mind. I had no idea at the start what the subject was, or anything. At the end I was convinced of his guilt, and puzzled that anyone else would come to a different conclusion.
If you do some research beyond what was presented on the podcast, it turns out it was not really that clear-cut at all. It’s actually pretty amazing how much the prosecution completely fabricated almost everything. I’m not saying he didn’t do it, but based on the actual physical evidence they had that tied him to the crime (none, really), he should have never been convicted. The State’s whole case and timeline of events was built around the cell tower pings, which cannot in any way prove someone’s location, not even by a longshot, and they should have been inadmissible. He deserves a new trial, and good luck to them proving anything without that cell tower “evidence”. Check out the Undisclosed podcast, where a bunch of lawyers super break it all down. (warning: it really gets into the weeds of legal stuff) http://undisclosed-podcast.com/
Were you convinced of his guilt because your “gut” said so, or were you convinced there was enough evidence to convict him of the murder and the court had heard all cases presented well?
Because if it’s the former that means nothing, and if it’s the latter you and I listened to different podcasts.
It was mainly a gut feeling. It just sounded to me like Sayed was lying. The presenter of the podcast sounded as if she believed him mainly because she wanted to. I think that the guy whom Sayed called to help bury the body was almost completely honest, and that the show was unforgivably unfair in the way they presented him, as if they were trying direct suspicion to him.
You can relax safe in the knowledge that you’ll be excused from the jury at the new trial then.
I wanted to believe Adnan Sayed, but in the end came away thinking he might have done it when I started out thinking he didn’t. What I’m 100% absolutely certain of? There wasn’t anywhere near the evidence needed to convict. Period. Based on what I heard, I had some very reasonable doubts, which happens to be the standard. I think the way the case was presented by Serial was incredibly fair. As @DThree seems to be able to come away with the conclusion that he did it, @robulus is convinced he didn’t, and I’m somewhat in the middle thinking that in any case the trial was a sham and that any half decent lawyer would have gotten him off.
So you like The Intercept do you?
The main thing I remember really hitting me hard from Serial and sticking with me is the police’s handling of the case, and then the consultant saying it was good police work when all they did was bully highschoolers into pointing fingers.
However, this case was never as clear cut as Avery.
I’m just someone with an opinion. However, if I had been on the jury, no matter how guilty Sayed seemed to be, I would not vote to convict if there was reasonable doubt.
I dont think I can commit the bandwidth to get into Serial (I already done my time, by binge-watching MaM).
But, to a lay person, doesn’t the whole case hinge on Jay’s testimony and what motive Jay might have for implicating Sayed? Does the defense ever suggest a motive for why Jay, an admitted co-conspirator in the murder, would do this? [A high-pressure confession coerced by the police, in the manner of Brendan Dassey from MaM?]
One obvious answer is “maybe Jay committed the murder.” His testimony as a “co-conspirator” meant he escaped prosecution himself.
This is the point, not whether or not we know he’s guilty based on gut feelings or whatever… if there was reasonable doubt and not even evidence he shouldn’t have been convicted… This is what our ENTIRE SYSTEM OF JURISPRUDENCE IS SUPPOSED TO BE BASED ON. Because we don’t want people with power using that against the rest of us. I mean, does no one actually watch 12 Angry Men anymore or do they just not give a shit?
I think many people really don’t give a shit.
Plus, I think that cop shows have warped our cultural perception. In mainstream (white) culture the cops are the good guys, and we root for them to win. When they bend the rules, it’s for a good reason, it’s worth it, because they are the good guys.
If they weren’t guilty, they wouldn’t have been indicted.
If they weren’t guilty, they wouldn’t have been arrested.
If they weren’t guilty, they wouldn’t be on trial.
If they weren’t guilty, the jury wouldn’t have convicted them.
Every stage of the process allows the participants to turn off their critical thinking skills, and have faith in the system without ever considering that it is completely rigged.
If I recall correctly, and it’s been a while, some organisation offered a reward of a few thousand dollars for information: an unknown person called in and pointed at Adnan, and claimed the reward. Shortly after the reward was collected, Jay - who had always been bumming rides off his friends - bought a car. Seems to me it would be really weird for anybody to risk a plea deal as accessory on a murder case, just in order to get a few thousand; but this case (like so many criminal cases) seems to have all sorts of odd loose ends. That’s what makes it fascinating: I was hooked on “Serial”, and that was a gateway for “Undisclosed”.
That’s an important point. When the public accuses the police of malfeasance, they set a high bar: “Why would the police frame an innocent man?”
But that would assume too much. It assumes the police knows the suspect is innocent. The correct question sets the bar lower: “Why would the police frame a guilty man?” To this question, there are a lot more possible motivations.
Another issue with a case is that once the police do zero in someone, declare him their suspect, and start amassing evidence, they really have boxed themselves in, if new evidence, pointing to a different person, should appear. They cannot backtrack now and target suspect #2: the first thing the lawyer for #2 will do is try to pin the crime on #1. (For this reason, if they do move on #2, they’ll often try to tie both suspects together, usually in the form of a pressured confession.)
Yeah, all these procedural cop shows if anything have lessened our ability to understand how the criminal justice system actually works (or not). It’s all supercops in NCIS, Law & Order, CSI. You never see the lazy detective, the biased detective, the ignorant detective, the sloppy detective, the superannuated detective, the hasty detective-- whom I’d like to think are a distinct minority, but whom I have no doubt cause the majority of all miscarriages of justice.
[quote=“petzl, post:17, topic:80762”]It’s all supercops in NCIS, Law & Order, CSI. You never see the lazy detective, the biased detective, the ignorant detective, the sloppy detective, the superannuated detective, the hasty detective-- whom I’d like to think are a distinct minority, but whom I have no doubt cause the majority of all miscarriages of justice.
[/quote]
I’m um, familiar with the genre*. Every so often the supercops discover that their predecessors put the wrong guy away, or that the overconfident non-supercop at a rival agency is on the take (NCIS), or that he’s actually a serial killer (JAG). Sometimes there’s a underling, with a lot of screen time, that’s “in league” with the serial killer. (Bones).
I recall an episode of Lewis in which it’s revealed that Morse’s inattentiveness to detail contributed to a guy’s death at the hands of the Stasi. In Endeavour, the prequel to Inspector Morse and Lewis, other cops are definitely on the take.
And I think there were a couple of dirty cops on Homicide, but tonally, tonally, that show stands out.
*On this site, this is quite likely a shameful, and humiliating admission on my part,
There are so many unanswered questions around Jay and his motivations. Undisclosed (as mentioned earlier) does a good job at looking at Jay’s ever shifting testimony as well as possible police coaching during his recorded interviews (AKA “the tapping”). All in all, he is possibly the worst witness against someone in the history of bad witnesses. If he is the bar that is used to measure someone’s guilt, we should all be in prison.
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