Sarah Koenig

To me, this question is the hard center of Adnan's case.

Can you tell, really?

Can you tell if someone has a crime like this in him?

I think most of us think if we know someone well, we can tell.

We act as detectives all the time, gathering evidence.

Certain scenes we remember, or the look on someone's face, or that thing he said when he got mad.

And then we act as a judge of character.

This is just a human thing.

But of course it's slippery because it's so subjective.

One person's evidence of good character is another person's evidence of questionable character.

Case in point, I heard from many people that Adnan was the opposite of violent, that he was someone who would take the heat out of tense situations.

This is Atif Iqbal, who knew Adnan from the mosque.

That's his real name and his real voice.

So for Atif, that kiss on the cheek is a tell.

It's the real Adnan.

But for that other guy who said Adnan stole and who thinks Adnan might be guilty of the crime he's in prison for, that same peacemaker quality was something he brought up to me as evidence that Adnan was full of shit.

Here's the curious thing, though.

The same people who tell me they think Adnan was capable of killing Hay, or that stealing from the mosque was a great evil, or that Adnan was a pathological liar, they also tell me, to a man, that Adnan was a great guy.

This is the same anonymous person who thought Adnan had taken many thousands from the donation boxes.

And that don't feel fake to you?