Topic: 0.01 btc per week for posts ~ Problems in Hser Ner Moo murder case (Read 1166 times)

A new thread has been created to post your observations and continue the discussion:

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/problems-in-hser-ner-moo-murder-case-help-review-the-case-earn-btc-1820534


@Agruw Please close this thread

1) Not a journalist lawyer or criminalist. The first article on the case had a clear tone that the person reporting thought he was innocent but she was afraid to do more than add a tone to the article, so I researched. After I had spent close to $100 buying evidence from the police legally I never saw any indication he might be guilty, but plenty of evidence pointing to 'others'. To date, the only evidence I have seen that needs to be researched further to eliminate any suspicion he is guilty is his comment about the shoes in tape 3. I do not know how he knew that. The only way to find that out would be to ask him and I am many thousands of miles away.

2) Regarding ""Mar Phi testified that he", somehow I had never read that article until I googled part of the quote http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865566454/Witnesses-in-Hser-Ner-Moo-case-testify-about-arrest-visit-of-murder-suspect.html . Another interesting quote from that article, which I had not seen before "Judge William Barrett issued a single-sentence gag order in the case Friday."It is hereby ordered that all witnesses, counsel, court personnel, interpreters, victim advocates and staff are prohibited from discussing anything about the (Esar Met) case with the media or the general public during the preliminary hearing, Nov. 8-16, 2012," the order states."

3) There are other, more serious problems with the roommates, but it would have been prudent to at least ask them what they were doing in the apartment for 29 hours with the girl having been dead for between 12 and 29 of those hours. The child was known to all the neighbors to visit that apartment to watch tv. The police were told that child went to that apartment frequently and that 5 males lived there.

4) Regarding the timeframe, if Met was a local who was comfortable with the busses and left his apartment at exactly the last moment to arrive at the busstop that had the first of two busses to his uncle's house, he could have left as late as 239pm http://archive.sltrib.com/story.php?ref=/sltrib/news/57939886-78/met-moo-hser-ner.html.csp

The initial investigation had a person who saw her at 215pm.

The bigger problem with the timeframe is not the busses though, it is the time of death. The room was chilly but Met was a tropical person. He owned only one jacket, the same light cotton denim jacket he is wearing in the video.

You can research the various factors affecting onset of rigor. The child was almost certainly alive while the police were deciding whether or not to issue an 'amber alert' and deciding whether to get a warrant to search a house where she often went i.e., the house where the roommates were 'watching music videos' and unable to hear the police pounding on their door.

5) A lot of evidence has gone missing in this case. I'm okay with that, as long as Met is given some reasonable way to defend himself and any evidence pointing to the real killer is not suppressed. A lot of high level cops want to keep their jobs, which is fine. But the case itself should temper their ambitions. Often a 'crime' is not committed exactly for the reasons it appears to be for. A person who has a fetish for candy bars might be called 'a shoplifter' if they don't have money. In this case it appears there is 'a person vigorously defending the honor of his group, by discouraging a girl who was talking too much to an outsider', and most people would say 'misguided but I see his logic'. What you really may have though is 'somebody using ethnic honor to justify his appetite for violence against a young child'.

In other words, the motive is important.
Was it an accidental killing? Probably not.
Was it a sex crime? Probably not.
Was it an attempt to control the child? Probably.
Was it a mix of different things? Possibly.

What is the explanation for the one piece of evidence that might exist against Met, his comment about throwing the shoes? A person would have to find the first mention of the shoes in any evidence paperwork and see if it precedes the confession. The few photos I have do not include the photo of the shoes. The police report does not mention that. But that photo was taken by somebody, it was entered into the evidence with some paperwork. If it convincingly existed before the confession, if that photo was taken with the other photos taken in the first few hours, then a person would have to talk to Mr Met and any translators or others who might have mentioned a phrase in Burmese like "shoes thrown in toilet". If that photo does not clearly exist as one of the first photos then it would be one more piece of doctored evidence in this case. Somebody saw the case was weak, looked at the confession tape and strengthened the case. 

I haven't posted my address because I thought my post did not bring enough to the topic, but I  appreciate the tip, thank you.
If I may ask, why are you doing research on this specific case? I'm curious if you're looking at from a point of view of a journalist, a lawyer, or a criminalist.

Things I would have pointed out as his lawyer:
"Mar Phi testified that he saw his nephew, Esar Met, 25, on the bus as he was returning home from work on March 31, 2008. Met was bringing something Phi had asked him to buy for his bike."
This means he wasn't running away, his visit was expected and he came prepared. This is interesting from the psychological point of view as he didn't clean the floor, left blood on the walls and allegedly threw her shoes in the trash, but washed himself, took the bicycle parts and calmly boarded the bus. I've seen the pictures and whoever murdered the girl was like a raging animal. Spilled blood all over the place and left parts of clothing on the floor. The police should thoroughly search the place and look for blood traces on the furniture, because if the roommates were involved there should be blood all around the apartment and it was later found that there was blood on the floor in the room they allegedly sat there until late evening. Was there really no other traces or were these traces missed. With the amount of blood on the walls and floor downstairs there had to be more stains in the other rooms. I also think the roommates should have been medically examined for signs of struggle, bruises and scratches, just like Met, but they were quickly released and not treated as suspects, even though the body was found in the building the all have access to, their DNA was under her fingernails and her blood was found on the floor in the room they all spend the evening together. based on these facts we can assume the forensics were sloppy, or the evidence was later destroyed.

We have a group of people with no alibi.
None of them cared about the stain on the floor. One of them said he knew the girl was missing and he knew Hser and his roommate (Met) knew each other, but didn't check if maybe she was downstairs.
The rest said they didn't know she was missing. How come? It was their neighbor's child and one of them knew she was missing. How come the rest didn't if they spent the evening together and the child was reported missing at 6 p.m.?

Another interesting thing is the medical examiner, who said:
"she would have died within minutes of the injury, but that the abuse could have lasted as long as an hour."
If we follow the timeline he had about 45 min to lure her into the apartment, beat her up, take her clothes off, rape her, and finally strangle her and drag the body to the shower, clean himself up, throw away the shoes, get bicycle parts, leave the house and catch the bus. Not impossible but very close. He also managed to calm himself down in less than 15 min, because according to his uncle and aunt he was calm, played with children and ate dinner.

Last but not least the hair evidence went missing and the prosecutor based the whole case on the DNA evidence from Met's jacket, even though it was circumstantial, because according to the examiners such small amounts can come from playing.

Unfortunately, even if he's innocent they have his testimony (even if it was obtained under duress), and will hide behind it every time someone tries to point out mistakes and omissions. His best way of defense would be to learn English in prison and get some confidence to make a statement and share with the world that he was intimidated and forced to incriminate himself.

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Tape 3 translated http://pastebin.com/gR984YPG The last 2 should be done this weekend.

The shoes being in the bathroom are not explained by the translation. There are only two explanations I can think of that explain that. a) Either Mr Met did throw them in the bathroom or b) they were put there to create one piece of evidence that could be corroborated by the translation.

If I can find any reference from the early days of the case that says the shoes were in the bathroom then I'll probably drop this, as it would be an indicator he might be guilty.

T- How about her shoes?
S-It was at the entrance.
T- which entrance?
S- In/out entrance
T- on the stair?
S-Yes
S- Whose shoes? Child shoes? Child shoes are not there.
T- Where?
S- I threw them into toilet, inside bath room.
T- Yes, they are asking about her shoes.
S- I understood he was asking about my shoe.
T-No, they are asking about her shoes.
S- I threw her shoes into bath room.
T- You hide her shoes?
S- Yes
T- When the child was dead, what did she do at lower floor?
 You got up stair,
S- I got up stair and, I saw that shoes when I was about to leave. I picked them and got down to lower floor. And I threw it into the bath room. People would know anyway, throwing shoes was nothing to be happened anything else. Let them knew no matter what happen and then shoes were thrown into bathroom.

If you can start a thread that includes all important info and write in better clear English than me I'll send 0.05 of which half to you for your work and half to incentivize people to research it. You can give 5 bounties of 0.005.

0.05 txid df34e10bfe8635a765b388ead1f152ceba7a96a91c1a7e220db76807bc86b727

His version of her death is not in any way even remotely close to any possible guess. He is pulling the confession out of thin air and doing his best to make it look believable. He has been brought to the point where he wants to confess, he would like to confess, the only problem is that he has no idea what actually happened and that is hampering his attempt to confess.



The guy who wrote that is doing the best he can. I'm getting several version done, including transcriptions of the actual Burmese words, and trying to anticipate any factors that might skew things. His translation is the most useful at this point. Worth adding, he has small girl children and said it was difficult translating that after the child was dead Mr Met confessed to dragging the body by the hair. I told him to just translate it. I did not tell him that the evidence shows pretty clearly that Mr Met did not drag the body by the hair. The translator even believes the confession to some extent. Met is being assaulted by a person familiar with Burmese interrogation techniques who is being directed by two U.S. 'law' officers who are familiar with U.S. techniques. It is like the perfec storm of false confessions. All that's missing is the bullet behind Met's ear.


That's probably the best observation in a while for somebody not familiar with the case. That evidence can be discounted on at least two grounds, but I will leave it. I'll only say look carefully at the exact words used by the person who gave that testimony. Your raising of that issue though shows you did read a bit about the case and is worth 0.01 if you post a bitcoin address.

da11 0.01 txid 7663e068a0ebd6e4c651df28ecac0c7393029b4b0d389469fb4ce31f623a5f11

It's difficult to approach the given problems, because from the way you have written the facts it's obvious there have been some oversights.
If Met was beaten during the interrogation and as mentioned there has been blood on his clothes there are grounds to accuse the police of making him give the statement under duress. In European the officer found guilty of it can be sentenced to 1-10 years of imprisonment. He needs a good lawyer to point it out and file for revocation or annulment.

Thoughts after reading the transcript:
I agree with the court that the questions weren't abusive to him and the interrogation seemed normal. I have been interrogated by the police and there wasn't anything shocking in the questions, they are known to be pushing people to speak by using the carrot and stick method.
He seems to be telling the truth about the child falling from the stairs and dying. He describes it in detail (she kept shaking, he didn't know what to do).

There's basically two explanations.
1. He saw her die or saw her hit her head and thought her to be dead.
2. He was told in detail what to say before the interrogation.

A young boy can be easily intimidated. A young boy softened up by a couple hits in the face and intimidated by older policemen would break instantly. There should give a video of his interrogation to a psychologist for review.

Other things I have noticed:
The transcript of the interrogation is written very poorly to the point of it being unreadable. Example: "He liked you decide, about what was happened?"
I've read more and found that: "Met's interview was inadmissible as part of the State's case-in-chief because the translator assisting the interviewing agents grossly misinterpreted the Miranda warning given to Met prior to his interrogation." They should really check if the translators actually have some basic knowledge of the target language before hiring them.

The evidence is circumstantial and there are no witnesses that saw him with the victim. Basically the only evidence is the body found in his apartment, but he wasn't the only one with the keys.
What I'm interested in are the scratches on his thighs and hips. I'd like to see him explain how he got them.

Good idea. I was thinking of that earlier today; to reorganise the information on Met's case found in both threads and presenting it as one clear, easy to read thread.

I agree to look at any rewrite, but I could rewrite it myself as well.

Whatever suits you best.

txid 7a4ce2a8be86487a13ac767b19a3be771e535f711a40b46d1afd0679e21b05f3

It'll be a few days at least, I want to get the translations done first.

One more thing though. The first time I tried this a person gave a very helpful comment like 'There might be evidence but the stuff is so boring I couldn't even read past one sentence'.

I am a shitty writer and very boring to read. If somebody rewrites the op of this thread, without omitting any info, but makes it more readable so people will read it, then I'll pay them 0.01 btc. I'll send that to you with 0.01 for your work if you agree to look at any rewrite a person submits and if there is more than one then to choose which one is best. It has to have all the basic info of the original post at the top of this thread but just rewritten so it gets read and maybe a catchier title.

Ok no problem, just send it to the same adress as before. I will keep an eye on this thread while I'm reading more into the case and make sure that new posters will be made whole.

Enjoy your trip!

Here is a cleaned up version of the 1st two tapes, the words are not changed but format has been tidied up.

http://pastebin.com/HLUh5RhM

Note that prior to confessing he was told "The body of the child with the footprint of your leg and blooded blood from you kick was found in your bath room" and "The child blood was found on your bed" and "This girl’s blood is found on your bed. And Her blood is found on the wall".

The first version of his confession does not even remotely match the physical evidence but it does match what he was told. He will go on to revise his confession each time more details are given to him. The only thing he refuses to go along with is raping the child. I do have questions about how he knew the shoes were thrown but that tape has not been translated yet and my guess is that the translator helped him with that too. One early observer of the crime scene remarked that the shoes had looked very out of place, like they were thrown.

RJX if you don't mind I will send you 0.04 to pay out 0.03 and keep 0.01 for your troubles. I may go sort of camping in the next week or so and not have steady internet access. Just give 0.01 per week for three weeks as long as there is at least one poster per week.

Worldwide police officers receive awards for solving crimes. It is this reason that they do not care who to arrest and how to beat out from it recognition. If the cops be rewarded for the absence of crime in their area then they pass by even if you are going to kill someone. To deal with the torture you need to change the reward system.

This person is not bluffing. That is my Bitcoin adress, as one can check in my profile, and I received BTC0.01 after little under a week, simply for adding my two cents on the matter presented by OP.

Thank you very much Agruw!

I don't think it was exactly fear. He says at one point that he is being refused the chance to speak freely so he is resigned to saying what they want him to say. He's tired and wants to get some rest before they shoot him.


There is a tremendous amount of evidence that was collected in this case. Most of it has vanished or been lost I guess. All that remains is the evidence that is ambiguous and could be construed as not excluding Mr Met as a suspect.

I don't have access to the bulk of the material and I am not in the United States so it might be difficult to purchase material from the police. If somebody currently in the U.S. wants to go shopping I don't know exactly what they still have but I'll pay for material. You just have to send a letter to the police agency asking what material is for sale on that case.

I have the confession and a highly redacted police report with some extra evidence pages and some photos.

If somebody can get the roommate interviews and the interview with the 6th person I'll pay a premium. The fbi files would probably have been destroyed by now, but if they have any material the price might be better than Salt Lake.

Because the central problem in this case is misconduct by police and fbi in a very gruesome crime, and because there is already a strong indication that the investigation was thoroughly bungled, it might be hard to get cooperation from authorities. They might resist.

I don't think he was speaking the truth, I think that his statements were given in by fear and were the result of a man no longer able to speak freely because he was paralysed by fear. Such statements should always be rejected by the court.


Sadly, this is how sometimes goes. But that might just be an entrance into breaking open the case and reviewing the convinction. As far details are concearned: I don't think you've passed on even 5% of information on this case and that's where confusion can arise. I'm not defending the courts decision, I just stir the stew to make sure all potatoes get a chance to surface and nothing gets stuck to the bottom.

1) I'm not following the logic of "So for the suspect, just being in that interrogation room is highly coercive, I agree. But strictly speaking there is nothing that points to coerciveness of the interrogation itself." Coercion is subjective and it either is a factor in the responses of the person being interrogated, or it is not. Is the FBI agent forcing him to say something specific, or is the FBI agent trying to get honest information?

coercion
the action or practice of persuading someone to do something by using force or threats.

2) Miranda rights are not relevant in a case like this and neither the defense nor the prosecution has any interest in them. The question is whether or not he committed the crime.

3) Coercing a confession is not an acceptable practice in any court. Please read the links here https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/update-esar-met-translation-added-are-these-two-confessions-real-or-coerced-1814169 especially https://www.innocenceproject.org/causes/false-confessions-admissions/ and http://listverse.com/2013/05/22/10-controversial-convictions-based-on-false-confessions/

It's sort of like "Is it acceptable to serve wood alcohol to guests at a wedding?" It doesn't have to be legislated. The solution is not to hire an utter moron to mix drinks. In some countries it used to be a regular headline "20 wedding guests blinded by drinking rubbing alcohol". Likewise it is widely known that coercive interrogation does not lead to factual confessions. If a detective or fbi agent is not aware of that then, like the simple bartender who serves wood alcohol, he or she needs to be employed elsewhere.

~

The basic question is whether he was speaking the truth in his confession. The evidence is very obvious that he was not. Why was he not speaking the truth? Did he make an effort to speak the truth? Was pressure put on him to say something specific regardless of veracity?

There was never any investigation done in this case. The child disappeared. the body was found. Immediately mobs started challenging the competence of the fbi and police, with obvious cause. The police needed to arrest somebody immediately and they did. They arrested the wrong person. I might be careless with some details but my view is reasoned and based on the evidence. The prosecution case is not.

1BXNsrs8gfM7xHXS7dVaLTybjmSTW1hmcZ


Yes, the beating has big influence on the suspects perception of the following interrogation and from what I read the defense could've done a better job pointing that out to the judge because nowhere I read that this argument has been (sufficiently) weighed, or has been weighed at all. So for the suspect, just being in that interrogation room is highly coercive, I agree. But strictly speaking there is nothing that points to coerciveness of the interrogation itself.



The first of the Miranda rights is the right to remain silent. I assume he's been read these rights, if not he should be released immediately. If he was read these rights this question should be awnsered.


Coercive interrogation is a hot legal topic, it is not illegal. Torture is. I cannot say anything about supposed wordgames and I am not trying to twist context.


I encourage nobody in their mistakes. I'm not saying the judge was right or wrong. I simply reply based upon the information that I'm given.


It is not unreasonable at all. The problem lies in the absence of information that proves the judge was wrong. It makes for very thin argumentation.

Please post your btc address


1) The beating he received before the interrogation had a direct bearing on the atmosphere of the interrogation. Therefore even if there had not been coercive techniques used, the interrogation would have been coercive.

If a group of heavily armed men come to your house, or the judges houses, break down the door and shortly after ask you to confess to something of course you or the judges would say the confession was extracted under coercive conditions.

Why should Mr Met not be given the same right to not be forced to answer questions under that kind of cloud?

2) Coercive interrogation is not acceptable in the United States. In this case the judges are determined to support the prosecution by using word games. I'm not asking you to lie or misrepresent something or use sophistry to twist context. All a person is being asked to do is look at actual facts rather than distortions. Again, if those circumstances were used to get a confession from you or the judges, would it be considered admissable? The judges say that it would be and I am desperately asking them to reconsider.

3) Again, common sense. The country will follow the law layed down for it. If the judges and you want to redefine "coercive interrogation", if you want to change the definition of that phrase, it is your choice. It was not wise of the judges to issue a decision that justified that kind of interrogation of citizens such as themselves and Mr Met. They should reconsider, and people like you should not encourage them in their mistakes.

edit to add
In the next half an hour or so I am expecting more info and will post what I get. If at any time I see evidence that Mr Met did commit this crime I will drop the matter. So far the evidence points to him not having committed the crime.

Coercive and forced confessions are not the default method of justice in any society. They occur only when encouraged by those with power. There are many people in that community who were aware of what was going on and gave warnings in a way the judges are ignoring.

One more point

The copy of the interrogation that I received, and the copy which was reviewed by the judges, obviously has had part of the interrogation removed. Parts of the interrogation were snipped and the timestamping feature was disabled.

Even without considering that, there are problems with the confession.

Is it unreasonable to ask the judges to review the full unedited confession?

I will give it a shot:

Court reasones

The court reasoned that the interrogation did not employ the types of coercive interrogation techniques that could lead to the conclusion that testimony was not freely given.

This implies that coercive interrogation is not illegal. Apparently, there are types of coercive interrogation that are accepted and from this case I can only derive that coercive interrogation is illegal when testimonies are no longer given freely as a result of such interrogation techniques.

1)Does the fact that he was beaten by the police just before the interview not suggest a coercive atmosphere?

It certainly does. It does not however say anything about the coerciveness of the interrogation because the interrogation started after the beating.

2)During the interrogation he states that although he did not commit the crime, he is willing to give a confession. He also asks if he can speak to his mother before he is killed. Does that not suggest an element of coercion?

Based on just this information I'd say no. First one needs to indentify the elements of coercion and, effectively, fit them into a legal background that is this case. Based on what I read  here I see a terrified individual but nothing indicates his fears come from coerciveness.

3) During the interview he tries to give information regarding the day of the crime. The FBI agent cuts him off each time, saying things like 'no no no no no' any time Met tries to speak, unless Met says what the FBI agent tells him to say. Does that not indicate coercion?

Yes it does but as mentioned, coercive interrogation is not illegal. Within borders of reasonability, interrogators are allowed to apply pressure and it's up to suspect to be able to withstand that, at least to certain degree.