Today’s Episode of Undisclosed and Establishing Adnan Syed’s Actual Innocence
In today’s episode of Undisclosed, we presented evidence of Adnan Syed’s actual innocence. To refresh your recollection of the facts, Adnan was accused of murdering Hae Min Lee after school on Wednesday, January 13, 1999. School ended at 2:15pm, and Hae was supposed to pick up her cousin at Campfield Early Learning Center at 3:15pm. Given this, everyone agrees that Hae was abducted in that one hour window between 2:15 and 3:15pm.
At his PCR proceeding, Adnan presented evidence that his trial counsel failed to contact Asia McClain, an alibi witness who later signed an affidavit and testified that she saw Adnan at the public library next to Woodlawn High school on January 13th until 2:40pm. Maryland’s intermediate appellate court reversed Adnan’s convictions based on ineffective assistance of counsel in connection with this alibi. Three out of seven justices on Maryland’s highest court would have done the same. But they were the dissent, with the four justice majority concluding that “the jury could have disbelieved that Mr. Syed killed Ms. Lee by 2:36 p.m., as the State’s timeline suggested, yet still believed that Mr. Syed had the opportunity to kill Ms. Lee after 2:40 p.m. Ms. McClain’s testimony, according to her affidavit, failed to account for Mr. Syed’s whereabouts after 2:40 p.m. on January 13, 1999.”
In other words, the majority concluded that Adnan still had time to get a ride from Hae after 2:40pm and kill her at the end of that ride. That’s where Adnan’s new alibi witness comes into play. But, as our episode makes clear, this new alibi witness is in fact an old alibi witness whom Adnan told his team about back in 1999.
According to a memo found in the defense files, Adnan told his team the following on March 12, 1999, mere days after he was arrested:
According to Adnan, he told his attorney that, on January 13, 1999 (the day Hae disappeared), he came across his classmate Dion, whose car had broken down in front of the school gym. Adnan told Dion about his own recent car troubles with his Honda Accord (the same make and model as Dion’s car) and how his family’s mechanic had fixed it and could fix Dion’s car. Adnan said this interaction happened from about 3:00-3:30pm, and Adnan remembers it being the day of a boys’ home basketball game because of the increased activity on game days outside the gym (where this interaction took place).
My efforts to track down Dion for the podcast failed because I didn’t know he’d moved west. But he reached out to Rabia, who was able to interview him recently. As you can hear on the episode, Dion remembers this interaction with Adnan but could not pinpoint the day, which is why he hadn’t come forward earlier (in addition to never being contacted by Adnan’s trial counsel).
But, he was able to relay the following information: (1) the interaction happened on a Wednesday or Thursday, possibly a Friday because those are the days he trained for baseball; (2) he started training for baseball in mid-January; (3) the interaction happened during Ramadan because Adnan and he talked about Adnan fasting; (4) the interaction happened roughly from 3:00-3:30pm because he had gone home after school before coming back to school to train; (5) his car broke down in front of the concession stand (which was at the front of the gym); (6) there was a boys’ home basketball game that day because he would attend those games after baseball training when they were held the same day; (7) the interaction happened as Adnan was going to or coming from the public library next to Woodlawn High School; (8) the interaction happened as Adnan was going to or coming from track practice; (9) the interaction happened on a warm day that turned cold; and (10) his car had previously been temporarily fixed on an unseasonably warm Saturday in January before breaking down after he drove it to school for a few days.
Cross-referencing what Adnan and Dion said with (1) the school schedule; (2) Adnan’s attendance record; (3) historical newspapers; and (4) historical weather reports, I was able to go through every day from January 1st to January 24th, 1999 to corroborate Adnan’s claim that he saw Dion on Wednesday, January 13, 1999, the day Hae disappeared. Here is my day-by-day accounting:
-Friday, January 1st: New Year’s Day and also during Winter Break, so there was no school
–Saturday, January 2nd: a weekend day and also during Winter Break, so there was no school
–Sunday, January 3rd: a weekend day and also during Winter Break, so there was no school
–Monday, January 4th: first day back to school, but Adnan was absent
–Tuesday, January 5th: TRACK MEET AT FIFTH REGIMENT ARMORY AT 3:45P.M.NO BASKETBALL GAME
–Wednesday, January 6th: Adnan was absent
–Thursday, January 7th: NO BASKETBALL GAME
–Friday, January 8th: snow day, so there was no school
–Saturday, January 9th: a weekend day, so there was no school
–Sunday, January 10th: a weekend day, so there was no school
–Monday, January 11th: MONDAY
–Tuesday, January 12th: TRACK MEET AT FIFTH REGIMENT ARMORY AT 3:45P.M.NO BASKETBALL GAME
–Wednesday, January 13th: boys’ home basketball game against Parkville (66-56 win for Woodlawn); high of 58 degrees; low of 35 degrees; day Hae disappears
–Thursday, January 14th: ice/snow day, so there was no school
–Friday, January 15th: ice/snow day, so there was no school
–Saturday, January 16th: a weekend day, so there was no school
–Sunday, January 17th: a weekend day, so there was no school
–Monday, January 18th: Martin Luther King, Jr. day, so there was no school
–Tuesday, January 19th: Eid al-Fitr, marking the END OF RAMADANAdnan had an excused absence
–Wednesday, January 20th: half-day for exams, with school getting out earlyafter Ramadan
–Thursday, January 21st*: half-day for exams; seemingly no track practice based on exams/end of semester + calls on Adnan’s call log; after Ramadan
–Friday, January 22nd: end of the semester, so there was no school
–Saturday, January 23rd: a weekend day, so there was no school
–Sunday, January 24th was a weekend, so there was no school
As you can see, Adnan’s claim that he saw Dion and his car on Wednesday, January 13th works well with each of the ten things that Dion remembered about the day in question. On the other hand, many of the other days cannot possibly be the day Adnan saw Dion due to there being no school, Adnan being absent, or there being an adjusted school/after school schedule due to exams and the end of the semester. That leaves just five days during this period that could conceivably be the day Dion saw Adnan, with two of those days getting knocked out because they had track meets, meaning Adnan would have been miles away after school (and neither day had a basketball game). That leaves just three days that could conceivably be the day Dion saw Adnan, with Wednesday, January 13 being the only one of those three days with a boys’ home basketball game (and multiple other reasons ruling out the other two days).
Simply put, the day Dion saw Adnan was Wednesday, January 13th, the day Hae disappeared. Adnan now has an alibi through 3:30pm, well past the time that Hae would have needed to leave Woodlawn to pick up her cousin at 3:15pm. That is evidence of actual innocence.
-CM
*I initially thought that Thursday, January 21st was a half-day for exams with school getting out early. But I now believe it was a half-day for exams with school starting late, but also with no track practice due to exams and/or the end of the semester.