Serial - the podcast *spoilers*

I can't tell anymore if I actually disagree with her on some things because she's woven such a complex web of interrelated points and I feel like it would take me a week to sort everything out.

But it also makes me wonder: given enough time and resources and complexity, would it be possible to create a reasonable doubt in many, many other "solved" cases as well?

Like one thing I wonder a lot: what if the case simply didn't involve cell phones at all? What if it was just Jay's testimony, never altered in any way to match cell phone records, just his rough, imperfect recollection of the day, with nothing to properly "verify" it. And what if, going a step further, they more "thoroughly" investigated Jay and found nothing more conclusive on his role? (after all, it was strangulation -- you're not going to find a murder weapon, there may simply not be conclusive DNA, it's hard to imagine what a search of his house would turn up). So all you have is (1) the testimony of a guy who admits to being an accomplice after the fact, (2) a highly plausible though not air-tight motive, and (3) the absence of a more likely suspect. What do you do? Prosecute Adnan? Prosecute no one? This is the kind of more general "question about the criminal justice system" that the whole thing raises for me.

Try for a plea with Adnan. Failing that probably prosecute with weak case.

I think cases involving the rich and famous has showed that with enough money and a good enough lawyer, almost everything can go away. In Serial they keep saying that this case is special, that most murdertrials are pretty open and shut. And no matter what happened, the murderer was incredibly lucky, killing Hae in public and not being noticed. It's a weird case from the start.

Total aside, but is anyone familiar with research on juries' ability to assess credibility? I have googled around but I can only find stuff specifically relating to visual cues, not the ability to assess credibility more generally.

Not even sure how you would measure that? I mean what's the credibility control?

The AV Club has a long interview with that good blogger: http://www.avclub.com/article/week-serial-serial-v-club-seeks-legal-counsel-213915 It's interesting.

That was a disappointing interview. At more than one point, it sounded like the interviewers were busy doing something else at the time.

Or, at any rate, hadn't actually read the blog.

Yeah, it's not a very good podcast. It's far better than last week, though, which they allude to throughout the interview. And the thing about the prosecution being really late in turning over evidence to the defence, and the transcripts from Jays interview for example only getting to CG on the day of his cross examination, that is interesting. And Susan Simpson is great.

The day of the cross examination of the first or second trial? If that's true that does seem totally unfair, but even if true for first trial how could it be true for second?

"good blogger" not so impressive on that podcast. Evidence of Jay "lying" is being offended that Serial aired the words "animal rage" about him?

seems kind of dumb talking about Jay's community and "snitching culture"

"Good blogger" actually not so impressive overall and big on wild stretches. Recent example:

Jay starts out he's at home at 4:58.
Cops incorrectly think cell tower for 4:58 call is far away from Jay's home and close to Cathy's house.
Jay oh wait I'm must be at Cathy's at 4:58.
Cops realize mistake and figure out cell tower for 4:58 call is actually near Jay's house.
Jay says oh I was at home then.
Blogger he was COACHED here is the evidence!

There is nothing nefarious here. Jay's confronted with a piece of evidence that seems to contradict his (shoddy) memory of events. Police say "are you sure you were at home?" Jay says "oh I must have gone to Cathy's earlier" thinking well here is this piece of paper indicating HE MUST HAVE DONE JUST THAT. Police say okay. Police come back with corrected tower info and say "wait we were wrong about where that tower was, were you actually at you own house after all?" and Jay says "yeah I was at home, I thought for sure I was." There is nothing remarkable in this and I think just about every non-Jay human would also conclude that they might be misremembering where they were and adjust accordingly.

I feel like "good blogger" and some other pro-Adnan folks have little dials they use to lower their IQs when trying to imagine why a black drug dealer in Baltimore might not have a lot of trust in the police.

I think Susan Simpson could have won Adnan's trial, I'll say that. I don't know how her courtroom demeanor is, but she sounds like a very good lawyer.

I do think that she's so certain Adnan couldn't have done it that she's willing to draw every inference against Jay. But she's very good at poking holes in the prosecutor's theory, and showing why, actually, it's not completely certain that the phone records back up Jay on "the essential points." Ultimately trials aren't decided on airtightness though, they're decided on juries assessing the credibility of the story. One of the juror's interviewed on Serial said she just believed Jay, that the story was believable. Yes, part of this was thinking he was going to get jail time (it's not clear whether he actually knew he wasn't), but she heard him there in the trial and believed him.

xp I agree completely on that point about the "coaching." Thought that was ridiculous. But she does raise an interesting point -- whether or not there was "nefarious coaching" or just innocent fixing of the story to fit the calls, if the story is completely shaped around the calls then it weakens the certainty that the calls back up the story and vice versa, particularly when Jay can't seem to definitively fix the time of the burial, the time and location of the trunk pop, the "come get me" call, etc.

The calls back up Jay in the following ways:

1) Jay and Adnan both had the access to the phone post-track practice until around 8ish. They were likely together for entire period of time. This matches all the timelines that Jay has provided very generally (if not the exact times or events within timeline) and it is during this period when Jay (usually and most importantly at trial) indicates the body was buried.
2) Based on most of Jay's versions of events Jay and Adnan were burying the body in Leakin Park at roughly the time the Leakin Park pings occurred. This is obv very important if those tower pings are accurate, less meaningful if they are not.
3) Adnan was likely with the phone prior to track (Nisha call). This actually does not match of any of Jay's timelines IIRC, but it does back up Jay's assertion that they were together between school end and track. It matches the prosecutors' timeline (which is almost a "this is what must have happened because Jay doesn't remember good" timeline). Most importantly it completely undermines Adnan's assertion that he did not see Jay until after track.

I'm actually surprised more people don't focus on the 6:59 Yaser call, that one puts the phone in Adnan's hands literally one minute before the page to Jenn, and a few minutes before the (perhaps) Leakin' Park calls. It also gives you AT MOST a two hour window in which the phone could have been back with Jay and not with Adnan, because Adnan pretty clearly starts calling his friends around 9pm. And that's assuming it was like, Adnan calls Yaser, immediately hands the phone back to Jay, Jay drops him off at home or wherever.

Of course, Susan Simpson also now casts some doubt on the pings. As far as the burial time, I don't think Jay in either police interview clearly sets a time on it other than late evening, and even his trial testimony suggests it's later than the 7-8pm timeframe (though it's a little unclear).

So just to give the benefit of the doubt to camp Adnan here, I think they're saying we don't actually have a clear basis to be sure the burial happened in the 7-8pm timeframe, and to the extent Jay's testimony backs that up (I'm not even sure it does), he may have shaped his testimony to fit the cell records so that theory could be pushed.

But I think any pro-camp-Adnan alternate theory would require the burial to happen at another time, because I don't find it very plausible that Jay drops off Adnan at 7pm sharp, keeps the car and phone, immediately pages Jenn, goes and gets Hae's car, buries Hae, ditches the car, and dumps the shovels, and Jay gets back to Adnan (at mosque?) within two hours. It's certainly more possible with Jenn's or someone else's help, completely impossible without it (because it would mean walking long distances as well, not to mention dragging a body by yourself).

I wonder if people will still be impressed with SK/TAL's integrity and sensitivity if they actually sell the adaptation rights to Ryan Fucking Murphy

Woah really. That's shitty.

Wait is this actually happening or just wacky Hollywood rumor weirdness?

RMs production company seems to be the top contender, looking at doing a limited series on HBO, but yeah it could be Hollywood BS

But i love idea of HBO suits thinking "We'll do another show about crime and race in Baltimore but this time let's have an idiot run it"

why is a show about this needed? this case is so boring now.

they need to actually have dennis rodman portray jay and maayybe i watch

something weird about hearing SK tell Terry Gross that she wished there'd been no SNL or Funny or Die parodies because the case is so serious and then finding out that they're shopping Serial around to Hollywood producers. Maybe it's all Ira though.

This is such a bad bad idea.

i guess hbo is also trying 2 spin this to serial fans, it could be really good regardless - robert durst docuseries

http://www.hbo.com/the-jinx-the-life-and-deaths-of-robert-durst#/

Ryan Murphy bursts through the double doors of the conference room, startling the NPR and HBO execs sitting around the table. He stands before them, beaming with utter confidence.

"Ladies and gentlemen, my pitch will be brief." Glancing at the nearest executive, he asks her "May I have your pen?" She looks to the senior executive sitting at the other end of the table, who nods his assent. The exec hands the pen to Murphy. He proceeds to write down a few w brief words on the legal pad she was using. As soon as he finishes he gets up and heads toward the door, but not before turning back to the execs in the room. "You know where to contact me." He bows, turns and exits through the double doors.

A few moments later the senior executive breaks the stunned silence that has overtaken everyone in the conference room. "Wanda, what did Mr. Murphy write down?"

"Just four words" replies the younger executive. She holds up the pad for everyone to see. In bold block lettering filling almost the entire page is Murphy's pitch:

THIS AMERICAN HORROR STORY

Immediately the senior executive leaps up from his chair and jumps on the table. "KAAAAAA-CHING!!!!" he cries as his hair stands on end, his tongue sticks out, and his pupils morph into dollar signs. He then collapses. The next day he is pronounced dead.

https://mobile.twitter.com/rabiasquared/status/556498629872345089

Rabia going on downward spiral

She's seems like a pretty intense person.

I think this is a good example of how good people feeling righteous can potentially do harm, like Rabia and Susan Simpson are wholly convinced they are fighting a virtuous battle to exonerate an innocent man, whereas they may actually just be needlessly upending the life of a different man who is actually innocent. And it's a little gross to me how much both of them have it in for Jay, but again, they feel they are fighting a virtuous battle, and I don't ultimately know with 100% certainty whether they're wrong. I do still feel like when you have a man who has been convicted, had a competent if imperfect defense, has had access to legal help and the ability to appeal multiple times, and thus far nothing has overturned the results of the trial, you'd better have some damned good new evidence to start disturbing all the settled sediment again, whereas this "ask questions" and "poke holes" game can be played ad infinitum to no particular end.

Rabia is touting some new info about Asia M. but she's linking to Glenn Beck's website so I guess I'll never find out what it is

Basically Asia McClean has filed an affidavit asserting she was with Adnan at 2:30 that day, she neve spoke to CG and Urick discouraged her from testifying.

Rabia is now in full Urick is worst prosecutor ever mode.

Does she also have some gold to sell us?

There are a few holes in the alibi.

The affidavit is pretty damning.

not really

Urich discouraged a witness from testifying and then lied under oath about what she said to him?

the thing about Adnan's family pressuring her? good luck getting a new trial with that.

The whole thing is bizarre: Adnan's defense team tries to contact Asia, so she calls the guy who prosecuted Adnan, who persaudes her that Adnan is guilty.

like why wouldn't he?

though I guess it's cool that right wing websites have moved on from Benghazi to a new obsession

I'm confused, when did Ulrich testify under oath? Was that related to the appeal?

Urick, sorry

so now asia says she never received pressure from adnan's family or chaudry, and that she never recanted her affadavit - and urick says she's lying. what would asia have to gain from lying?

ok, if she didn't recant her testimony then why couldn't Adnan's team use her? Is she saying that Urick forged her name on documents or something?

The whole issue is why Adnan's team didn't use her. That is why they are claiming ineffectual counsel.

Urick testified during the appeal trial that she called him and told him that she only wrote those letters because Adnans family pressured her, something she now says that she never said, and that she has notes from the phonecall backing this up.

Of course, the ironic thing is that Asias alibi actually isn't an alibi at all. It just would have worked that way because the prosecution botched the timeline so badly.

Sidenote, but I love the fact that Urick is the one name we consistently misspell. I'm not during it with intent, I just constantly think it's with an h.

The whole issue is why Adnan's team didn't use her. That is why they are claiming ineffectual counsel.

Adnan's first lawyer never contacted her at all. When he went for an appeal, his new legal went looking for Asia, who at that point contacted Urick. Urick says that she then recanted her affidavit in writing. Adnan's new team could not use her.

If she never recanted then Adnan should have been able to use her. A lot of this is not so believable. It seems like she went from being willing to help, to not wanting to be bothered, to suddenly being part of a nationwide phenom.

Where does Urick say that she recanted in writing?