A photocopy of a picture found in Hae’s belongings of her and Adnan together in Patapsco Park.
A few days ago Susan blogged, after many moons and much anticipation (I love her posts), and what a write-up it was. Susan tackled the very difficult and sobering issue of the lividity, the way Hae’s body was found at the crime scene, and mysterious marks that appear on her body in the autopsy photographs.
The most salient points that I want to discuss in her post are these:
- Hae’s body was found in Leakin Park in a position like the clay figure Susan created below. These are pictures the police showed Jay, which is why he came up with the phrase “pretzeled up” to fake-describe what she looked like in the trunk of Adnan’s car, where in fact she had never been
This figure is laying on a flat surface, but Hae was partially in a shallow dip behind a log. She was not entirely in it, it wasn’t that wide or deep a hollow. Mostly her torso was in the lower part, while the rest of her body was around ground level.
- She was mostly covered with dirt and leaves, with one large rock on her right hand, though it still protruded into the air above ground
- She had, again, full anterior lividity, according to the medical examiner at the time, according to the autopsy report, according to trial testimony, and according to every expert we have since asked to review the photographs and reports. The lividity ran from her face, down her torso, and to her legs. It was symmetrical.
- There were three double diamond shaped marks around her shoulder area, which Susan illustrated thusly
- The one furthest on the right of her body is just as marked here, distinct, with clear sharp edges, the little center pronounced, probably because the surface of the body here is very flat. The others are not as clearly shaped and travel on the curves of the body. Whatever made the marks is NOT a net or something else that would create an outline. It is a solid, flat item in a double-diamond shape.
- According to the experts we consulted these marks were made while the lividity set into the body, which is why they are fixed.
- There are almost no other marks on her body, not even the mark of things one would expect, such as a bra.
Those are the major factual points raised by Susan. This isn’t being done for fun, none of this is fun. But there is a small group of sick people on Reddit, who are probably paid disrupters considering their posting patterns, who have apparently gotten a hold of the crime scene pictures and have been passing them around. Let that sink for a bit. Anonymous, random internet strangers passing pictures of Hae’s body around. Not because they are credentialed or experts, but just because they can. And thanks to their noise, there is a chance these pictures may get released onto the internet. I hope, for Hae and her family’s sake, they are not. She doesn’t deserve it.
They are awful, devastating, heart breaking photographs to view. In the same way I never wanted to visit the burial site, I never wanted to see these pictures. But in the course of an investigation, it’s unavoidable. Susan, Colin, and I have done everything imaginable to honor Hae and not share the photographs unless necessary to render an expert opinion, even though they are part of the public record. For us, this is not about sensationalism , we are not engaged in a spectator sport. We are trying not only to exonerate Adnan, but also to determine what happened to Hae.
In order to do that, we have to return again and again to the real evidence, the only hard evidence we have. Hae’s body and the burial scene. That is where we will find our answers, it’s through these things that Hae will speak to us.
WHAT I HEAR
This is what I hear from the evidence, what I hear Hae tell us:
- In no uncertain terms was Hae left in the burial position until after lividity fixed in her body. The lividity does not match the body, period. The lividity fixed elsewhere, wherever she was actually killed.
- Hae was not neatly laid to rest. She was hastily dumped and covered up. Jim Clemente, the famous FBI profiler, has more to say about this, but you’ll hear from him when Bob interviews him in the near future.
- Her position suggests she may have been rolled in something to move her there, perhaps a blanket, and then unrolled and left in whatever position she landed in.
- She was still wearing jewelry, ie this was not a robbery as it was in Jada Lambert’s case.
- She was clothed, but her clothing was disheveled, her bra pushed up, her skirt pushed up. This likely happened from being moved to Leakin Park and not necessarily a sign of an assault.
- When the lividity fixed she was laying face down, flat. She was not in a car trunk. She was in a position that her face, body, legs were all laying flat.
- Her body was laying on something that made those shapes on her shoulders. Because of the way the shapes shift on different points on her body, I tend to think whatever made the marks was of a flexible material and not a hard, rigid material like steel, plastic, or wood.
- When people die in their clothing and lividity fixes with the clothing on, you can easily see the outline of the clothing. I won’t link to it but you can easily find photographs on line of bodies with lividity that have clear impressions of mattresses, entire bras, underwear, etc. Because there is literally no other mark on her upper body, it may mean she was not clothed above the waist when lividity fixed. I say may because I’m not an expert. But I see no way for no other marks to be visible. After all, she was found wearing a bra, but her body had no marks reflecting it. Which means, if she was indeed not clothed, and laying flat somewhere, it most likely was a private space, like a room, garage, etc.
- Because even mattress designs, carpets, and tiles will create marks on a body, she must have been laying on something smooth, ie a blanket, tarp, sofa cushions, etc.
The double diamond shapes could help us identify where Hae was killed and where her body was when the lividity fixed. The shapes, by the way, were identified and pointed out by Susan a while ago. We’ve been in private discussions and consultations trying to figure what they are. Going public with them, hopefully, will help us identify what made those marks. We are getting tons of suggestions, but most of those suggestions fit the “close but no cigar” mark.
I have yet to find anything that makes sense. It can’t be something like a continuous pattern on tile, or the back of a van, or even mattress design because the marks are not all over her body. They are in three distinct, discrete places. The marks get lighter from the right to the left. Could it be one single item that made the marks, if her body was moved around over it? Or was it three different items?
Was it a harness clip, the back of a man’s suspenders, a belt buckle, a rubber stopper, a money clip, a piece of flat plastic thats part of something like a toy, a hinge, what is it? I’ve spent hours searching images online. And still have not found a perfect fit.
Whatever it is, it is either tied to where she was killed, or tied to who killed her. It is either something that is found in the place she was killed, or it belongs to the killer.
A killer who had the opportunity to hide her, laying flat somewhere, likely unclothed from the waist up, for around ten hours as lividity fixed, and then move her to Leakin Park in the dead of night.
We will figure this out. I’m positive. God didn’t bring us this far for nothing.
Keep searching everyone, and keep sending us your suggestions. We need all hands on deck for this one.
NOTE: I spoke at a law school a few weeks ago and one of the faculty members, who has run the school’s criminal law clinic for 40 years, was adamant with me about his theory that her body could not have been in the woods for that many weeks without animal activity. He insisted that a place like Leakin Park, which has its own wildlife like foxes, but also urban pests like rats and mice, will immediately begin to gnaw at certain parts of a body. Eyes, nose, ears, digits to begin with, they go within days in the outdoors. He said insects growth is unavoidable in that many weeks, and he refused to believe she had been there that long. According to him, because her body showed absolutely no signs of animal activity, she could not have been there more than a couple of days.
I don’t know what to make of his theory, but if there are folks with expertise who have thoughts on this, please do tweet at me or send a message through the Undisclosed facebook page.
“K”
K is Adnan’s ex-wife, though she says she still thinks of him as her husband. They were married for two years, having met when Adnan was incarcerated in Jessup, before he was moved to the supermax facility where he’s currently housed.
K, whose name I’ll give at some point, wants everyone to know what she thinks about Adnan. We spoke at length in a recorded conversation last week, and the story of their relationship is both remarkable and heart breaking. It will be told, but just not yet.
For now, I wanted to share a short clip from our talk. This is K, responding to my question of whether Adnan was abusive or possessive, and what kind of man Adnan was to her.