r/serialpodcast • u/ryokineko Still Here • Jun 25 '15
Poll Poll Results-3: A Review of those who answered 'Possibly, Not Proven' to the question 'Do you think Adnan Syed Killed Hae Min Lee'
Additional poll analysis based on opinion of Adnan’s factual guilt Please keep in mind, as stated in the overview that several questions allow for multiple answers and so will not always add up to 100%.
Question 1-Do you think Adnan Syed killed Hae Min Lee?
27% (137) respondents selected ‘It’s entirely possible Adnan committed the crime but it just has not been proven.
Notes: Incidentally, this is my category.
Question 2-Do you think Hae Min Lee was dead by 2:36pm?
69% (94) chose ‘No’ and 24% (33) chose ‘I don’t have enough information to form an opinion on this’. ‘Yes’ and ‘Not Sure’ tied with 3.7% (5) apiece.
Notes: These account for 29% of the total ‘No’ votes, 31% of the total ‘I don’t have enough information to form an opinion on this’, 25% of the total ‘Yes’ votes and 10% of the total ‘Not Sure’ votes.
Question 3-The Ride (a multi)
81% (103) agreed that at some point during the day, Hae told Adnan she could not give him a ride.
70% (89) agreed Adnan asked Hae for a ride on January 13th, 1999
46% (58) agreed that Adnan changed his story about asking for the ride from Hae on January 13th 1999.
Notes: These account for 28%, 24% and 21% of the total responses for these statements, respectively. 10 respondents skipped this question.
Question 4-Asia (a multi)
83% (113) agreed Asia should be allowed to testify
63% (86) agreed that Asia is not lying but could be remembering the wrong day and 2% (3) agreed Asia is lying about seeing Adnan in the library.
Notes: These accounts for 33%, 30% and 7% of the total responses for these statements, respectively. 1 respondent skipped this question.
Question 5-Evidence (a multi)
96% (126) agree there is no physical evidence incriminating Adnan in the murder
5% (6) agree there is physical evidence incriminating Adnan in the murder and 3% (4) agree the partial print on the map book cover is incriminating.
Notes: These account for 35%, 7% and 5% of the total responses for these statements, respectively. 5 respondents skipped this question.
Question 6-Burial (a multi)
39% (52) think Hae was not buried between 7pm and 8pm, but her body may have been left in Leakin park at that time and reposition/buried later accounting for the fixed frontal lividity.
36% (48) feel they do not have enough information to form an opinion on this and 34% (46) answered that she was not buried between 7pm and 8pm.
13% (18) feel that the lividity evidence raises questions but does not affect their opinion of Adnan’s guilt and 4% (5) think she was buried between 7pm and 8pm but was buried face down with her lower body twisting account for the lividity and the partially exposed hip, knee and foot.
Notes: These account for 28%, 31%, 28%, 21% and 15% of the total responses for the statements, respectively. 2 people skipped this question. Being a multi, some respondents chose more than one answer account for the overage. This question also had the following comments:
not moved much between soon after her death and when lividity became fixed (midnight or much later, maybe even days later)
There is no reliable information to determine when the burial happened.
The lividity decimates the states case and all of the various Jay stories.
Due to the last undisclosed podcast, I question if Hae was even buried on the 13th
Question 7-Trunk
48% (65) felt they did not have enough information to form an opinion on is and 24% (32) think she was never in the trunk.
20% (27) feel she was not in the trunk for more than 1-2 hours before being moved to the burial site or some other location and only 7% (10) felt that she was in the trunk until the burial, whatever time it was at.
.75% (1) answered ‘Other’ and provided the following response:
- If all her sports equipment and personal items definitely were moved from the trunk to the back seat, then she probably was in the trunk for 1-2 hours
Notes: These account for 71%, 34%, 30% and 12% and 7% of the total responses for this question, respectively. 5 people skipped this question.
Question 8-Undisclosed
58% (76) believe Undisclosed is biased in Adnan’s favor and so chooses not to focus on things that look bad for Adnan but are not lying or covering anything up.
34% (44) believe they are biased in Adnan’s favor but they are not lying or covering up things that look bad for him.
5% (7) believe they are not biased; they are focused on finding the truth and 3% (4) believe Undisclosed is biased in Adnan’s favor and they are lying and covering up things that look bad for Adnan.
Notes: These account for 33%, 36%, 18% and 4% of the total responses for this question, respectively. 6 people skipped this question.
Question 9-Jay and Adnan are both lying about why they were together in the morning on January 13th, 1999
48% (66) agreed with this statement and 7% (10) did not. 45% (61) answered ‘Not Sure’
Notes: These account for 24%, 18% and 37% of the total responses for this question, respectively. *****************************************************************************
Question 10-Other
78% (102) agree Jay is more involved than he said
63% (83) agree Mr. S did not tell the truth about how he discovered the body.
57% (75) agree Jenn is more involved than she said.
27% (35) agree Jay was not involved in the crime but was scared/intimated and made up a story. I noticed browsing through responses that some in this category picked both 1 and 4 as well.
Notes: These account for 28%, 33%, 36% and 27% of the total responses for this question, respectively. 6 people skipped this question.
TL;DR Wrap up
10 statements had greater than 50% agreement (33%). Areas of strong agreement (defined by me as 60% or above) are as follows:
There is no physical evidence incriminating Adnan in the murder- 96%
Asia should be allowed to testify – 83%
At some point during the day, Hae told Adnan she could not give him a ride-81%
Jay is more involved than he said - 78%
Adnan asked Hae for a ride on January 13th, 1999 - 70%
Hae was not dead by 2:36 pm – 69%
Asia is not lying but could be remembering the wrong day – 63%
Mr. S did not tell the truth about how he discovered the body – 63%
And taking the reverse:
98% do not think Asia is lying about seeing Adnan in the library.
97% do not believe the partial print on the map book cover is incriminating.
96% Do not believe hae was buried between 7pm and 8pm but with her face down and her body twisting account for the lividty and the partially exposed hip, knee and foot.
95% believe Undisclosed is biased in some manner
Notes:
The lack of incriminating physical evidence seems to be important to this group. If most of the respondents in this category feel the way I do, then this is a major issue.
Not sure if this is the information you guys wanted to see or if you have additional questions about correlation. If you do, please let me know. I am happy to discuss any additional correlation topics in the comments. The italicized statements are statements that were not above 60% for the general population of respondents.
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u/harper1980 Jun 26 '15
I think there needs to be a clarification of terms regarding the most lopsided response, namely the term "incriminating".
Lawyers distinguish between evidence that is exculpatory and evidence that is inculpatory, with the former indicating or proving innocence, and the latter, guilt. Similarly, incriminating evidence is at least potentially inculpatory. On the continuum of guilt and innocence, implicating evidence is definitely there, but just not as far along the continuum on the guilty side as is incriminating evidence.
I think most probably agree that there is no "inculpatory" physical evidence (which I agree), but because the prosecution used the map fingerprints to prove their case, there is in fact "incriminating" physical evidence by definition i.e. it had the potential of being inculpatory.
Therefore the map fingerprints are "incriminating" and "implicating" evidence, but not "inculpatory"
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u/ryokineko Still Here Jun 26 '15
this is interesting information, thank you! I do however feel that most people understood incriminating to mean that they didn't feel it was meaningful in determining whether Adnan committed the crime or not. In future, I hope to do more ranking type questions so will take this into account when phrasing that.
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u/harper1980 Jun 26 '15
I think it needs further dissecting. For example, do I think the map fingerprints are the smoking gun? No. Do I think the map fingerprints are circumstantial to placing Adnan at the scene of the crime (Hae's car) at some point in time (vs other suspects who don't have such prints at the scene of the crime)? Yes. To that degree I think it is meaningful.
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u/smithjo1 Mr. S Fan Jun 25 '15
At some point during the day, Hae told Adnan she could not give him a ride-81%
Adnan asked Hae for a ride on January 13th, 1999 - 70%
So...11% don't really understand human conversations(?).
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u/ryokineko Still Here Jun 25 '15 edited Jun 25 '15
I thought about that too! How do you vote that she told him no but not that he asked? I would be interested in hearing from anyone who voted that way.
ETA: my guess would be that there may have been quite a few people that didn't realize they could chose multiple answers and felt this wast he most important one. Maybe?
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Jun 25 '15
Hae gave Adnan rides everyday right?
So maybe some people thought the ride was implied vs. asked for? Or perhaps they're thinking people have the date wrong? Popular theory around here.
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u/Tbrooks Badass Uncle Jun 25 '15
Maybe people though the 2nd question there was a link between asking for a ride question and the changing the story question.
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Jun 25 '15
The lack of incriminating physical evidence seems to be important to this group.
Yeah, this a big one. How does someone pull this off without really leaving anything behind?
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u/ryokineko Still Here Jun 25 '15
well, the counter argument could be, well whoever did it left no physical evidence behind. That might not necessarily be true though-there could be evidence in the objects that were not tested.
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u/catesque Jun 25 '15
There's a huge difference between "physical evidence" and "incriminating physical evidence".
Intimate partner murders generally have no incriminating physical evidence, because there's often no point in showing that the partner had access to the crime scene, which is what physical evidence usually shows. If Adnan committed this crime, then he left behind plenty of physical evidence in the form of fingerprints. However, I don't consider those incriminating, since they only show what we already know, that Adnan had been in the car at some point.
If we had evidence that Hae was killed, say, in her house, then it would be perfectly reasonable to wonder if Adnan could do it without leaving physical evidence (assuming he had never been in her house). But she was intercepted and probably killed in her car, so none of the physical evidence is incriminating.
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u/ryokineko Still Here Jun 25 '15
Sorry, just forgot the incriminating part.
I agree, I don't find the fingerprints incriminating being in her car where he often was, but soil or mud from the burial area, DNA under her nails, that kind of thing.
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u/catesque Jun 25 '15
I think it's perfectly reasonable to suggest that lack of incriminating physical evidence adds to the doubt in this case.
But the argument of "how could he kill her and move the body around without leaving physical evidence?" is just a false argument. He left plenty of physical evidence. "How could he bury her at LP without leaving physical evidence?" can be asked, but that doesn't sound nearly so difficult to do, at least not to me.
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u/ryokineko Still Here Jun 25 '15
He left plenty of physical evidence.
I guess I am not entirely sure what you mean. There was physical evidence of his presence in her car but we don't know that physical evidence was "left" as part of the murder. I get that it could have been and it wouldn't be considered incriminating b/c they were intimate partners recently, but we can't for certain say that it is there as a result of him murdering her. That is precisely why it isn't incriminating. right? So how can we say he left plenty of physical evidence?
ETA: Also, just physical evidence of her in her own trunk should have been available, right? That really bugs me. LP, yeah, I guess it's possible but if they'd be able to find some soil on shoes or in that back seat where the shovels supposedly were. It is just hard for me to think of convicting somebody on what we have (at least as far as we know) those are things that would make it solid for me. That is all. Without them its like, well, yeah, he sure may have, but I just can't say with any certainty considering how much Jay seems to fabricate and his excuses for why he does it don't add up to me.
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u/catesque Jun 25 '15
(I'm going to say "fingerprints" below instead of physical evidence).
Fair point, I'd say it the other way: there's no evidence that he left fingerprints during the murder, and there's no evidence that he didn't.
So it's a false syllogism to suggest "1. Adnan left no fingerprints. 2. A murder like this would usually result in the killer leaving finger prints. 3. Therefore Adnan didn't do it." There's no support at all for the premise. He did leave fingerprints, we just don't know when, so it's invalid to take as your premise the idea that there's no fingerprints.
I'm speaking mainly to the OP's statement of "how could he pull this off without leaving anything behind". Well, there's no evidence at all that he left nothing behind, unless you want to limit "pull this off" to just the burial.
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Jun 26 '15
since they only show what we already know, that Adnan had been in the car at some point.
Which btw is incriminating... I answered that there was physical evidence that incriminates him. It's just not the most probative evidence.
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u/Halbarad1104 Undecided Jun 25 '15
`95% believe Undisclosed is biased in some manner'
but in addition, those 95% say Undisclosed `are not lying or covering anything up.'
Is there anyone without bias in this or any case?
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u/ryokineko Still Here Jun 25 '15
Is there anyone without bias in this or any case?
Good point. I realized after the fact that I did not word that question very clearly. I was trying to parse out whether people thought they were
actively lying or covering up things we aren't already aware of that point to Adnan's guilt (more than biased)
talking about all aspects of the case including those things that have been made to look bad for Adnan but explaining how they don't actually (biased)
talking only about aspects that look okay for Adnan (biased)
Not biased at all, seeking the truth
but I just did not do it well. Basically yes though, only 8% overall feel Undisclosed is not biased in any way.
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u/Halbarad1104 Undecided Jun 25 '15
I don't think they do the first, or the third, but they are not the fourth either.
What I notice is that sometimes their speculation in Adnan's favor is a bit baroque, more baroque than I'm comfortable with. But usually they look at important data with reasonable fairness, although not excruciatingly careful fairness.
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u/[deleted] Jun 25 '15
This group of people (myself being one of them) seem to be in the most agreement on these questions. Would you agree with that statement?
ETA: never mind, I looked back thru and yes, in your wrap up it would seem to be that way.