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Hans Reiser Leads Police To Nina's Body
Posted by
kdawson
on Monday July 07, @10:05PM
from the removing-all-doubt dept.
from the removing-all-doubt dept.
jlmcgraw was the first to alert us that Hans Reiser has led police to the location in the Oakland Hills where he buried the body of his wife Nina. (We discussed the rumor that he would do so last month.) SFGate.com reports that remains were recovered but have not yet been identified. Reiser is to be sentenced on Wednesday. CBS5 claims that Reiser made a deal for a reduced sentence, to 15 years, in exchange for revealing the body.
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Hans Reiser To Reveal Location of Wife's Body 882 comments
dlgeek writes "The story of Hans Reiser is well known to all Slashdotters by now. Some still placed doubts about the conviction, stating that he might be innocent. It now seems that all doubt has been quelled, since Alameda County District Attorney Thomas Orloff has revealed that Hans Reiser will disclose the location of Nina's body for a reduced sentence.
The deal is not yet finalized, though. 'There's been some overtures,' Orloff said, 'But everything is in its preliminary stage.' The deal would reduce his conviction from first degree to second degree murder. In addition, an anonymous source close to the situation said that 'the only real leverage he has is if he can provide a body. He really doesn't have any options left. Even if he won a retrial somehow, he'd likely be convicted.'"
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Sad (Score:5, Insightful)
I feel bad for the kids - that is such a messed up situation.
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Re:Sad (Score:5, Funny)
Hans shot first
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Re:Still could be innocent (Score:5, Insightful)
He may have had knowledge of the murder, and use that to reduce the sentence.
I would be interested in your theories of how he could have had knowledge of the murder and not be guilty.
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Re:Sad (Score:5, Funny)
Comparison of filesystems on Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]
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Okay there you go (Score:5, Interesting)
All you people who said "I still don't believe Hans did it" -- do you doubt it now?
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Re:Okay there you go (Score:5, Funny)
The guy was persecuted for being a little strange, which is an outrage. Oh, and he also killed his wife.
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Re:Okay there you go (Score:5, Insightful)
Right. But you'd have to be bloody insane to think that maybe Hans didn't do it at this point. I mean, he knew where the body was buried.
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Re:Okay there you go (Score:5, Funny)
I mean, he knew where the body was buried.
Lucky guess!
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Re:Okay there you go (Score:5, Insightful)
Wasn't it more a matter of reasonable doubt?
I think most thought it was more likely than not that he did it. Just that there were reasonable alternative theories (ran away to frame him, insane best friend that claims to have murdered people still alive are 2 that I can think of).
I think a lot of people here wanted to believe he was innocent, perhaps because of the open source connection, perhaps because they could relate to him, I don't know. I always thought that the alternative theories were pretty weak - there was no evidence that crazy best friend did it and no real motive for Nina to try to frame him by fleeing to Russia without her kids. On the other hand there was a large amount of physical evidence, which taken together (and considering Hans' complete lack of a plausible explanations for any of it) didn't leave a reasonable doubt in my mind. Or the juries mind. And now a lot of people here have to admit that the police and the jury were right.
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Re:Okay there you go (Score:5, Informative)
Before, though, there wasn't even any definitive proof anyone had died. I thought that was kind of a prerequisite for charging someone with murder.
Not in any state that I know of. Otherwise, the only thing you'd need to do to get away with murder is dispose of the body.
Poison someone, dump them in the ocean with a rock tied to their ankle, and poof. No murder, right?
That's not the way our legal system works. A missing person, another person who was their known last contact, poison residue on their hands, a poison bottle in their possession, a car that's got sand from a particular beach on its tires, clothing fibers from clothing the victim was known to own in the car, receipts for rope, a blindfold and other tools in the murderer's possession, existence of a motive... that's enough circumstantial evidence to arrest and probably convict somebody in any state in this country.
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No more doubts about conviction (Score:5, Insightful)
Even after the conviction, given the circumstantial case some doubts remained. This certainly removes all remaining doubts.
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The kids... (Score:5, Insightful)
No matter how much we argue or try to make "programming jokes" about this incident the truth is these kids' mother is dead, their father is going away for a long time and they are going to be the ones bearing one of the heaviest burdens in this particular case.
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and slashdot joins.... (Score:5, Insightful)
all the people from LA.
last time I saw that sort of hopeful thinking it was kobe and people saying he didnt cheat on his wife. And he did. We all love our heros, dont we?
Well, heros are usually only good at the one thing they are touted for... im not asking kobe to fix my car for sure.
With all the smart people around here, why would anyone think that a computer programmer is any less suceptible to violent acts than any other?
I mean, is it just because computer geeks are well known as the most well adjusted people on the planet? :)
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Re:This makes me sad (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:I hear that (Score:5, Insightful)
I hope he gets his in prison.
As understandable as the sentiment is, that won't bring Nina Reiser back. I've lost a loved one to a drunk driver, and it isn't much comfort that the bastard went to prison. I hope his kids get a little bit of peace from the fact that at least they have a final answer on the matter, and that they'll be able to visit their mother's grave. This is just really sad; everybody involved loses.
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Re:This makes me sad (Score:5, Insightful)
Personally, because I'd have liked to have seen her turn up alive and well. A living person is better than a dead person any day.
Sadly, circumstantial evidence or not, the guy was clearly guilty as all hell from minute one. Even the weirdest, most anti-social geek I know doesn't do the strange shit he pulled in the days following her murder.
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Re:This makes me sad (Score:5, Funny)
Fuck you, ShaunC.
Don't you mean "fsck you?"
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Re:This makes me sad (Score:5, Insightful)
I used to have an attitude like that, but by definition anyone who behaves that way is obviously mentally ill, and probably a jail term is only going to make things worse for him. I'm not sure there is alternative though...
And that's what makes me sad, I don't think that there is an answer to the question 'what could have been done beforehand to prevent this?'. You can't just go locking people away because they are a bit (or a lot) arrogant and nerdy - slashdot's user base would disappear overnight! Maybe we need that 'voice in your head' ray gun pointing at people 24/7 with a message 'thou shalt not kill. thou shalt not kill. thou shalt not kill. (drink pepsi).'
Hopefully the kids are now in a more stable environment...
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Minority, not majority... (Score:5, Insightful)
He duped a minority, methinks.
There were lots of us who thought he probably did it: the "she ran away" excuse just never floated, and there was too much stupid circumstantial excuses (I don't care HOW much of a geek you are, doing BOTh the seat AND flooding the car AND saying you slept in the wet sopping car is just ridiculous)
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Re:He duped the great majority of us... (Score:5, Funny)
The correct English idiom is a bit different: the proof of the pudding is in eating. It is interesting to note that the idiom is paradoxical. What proof would remain, if youa ate Nina's body?
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Re:Choice of file system (Score:5, Funny)
This is just one more thing for the 15 year olds who think they're e-badasses because they use Linux to brag about.
"Oh yeah? Who designed your WinBlow$ file system? Just some monopolist? My file system was designed by a murderer. I totally have you beat."
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Re:The Ends Justify the Means (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh, come off it ... there was no reasonable doubt. Doubt that isn't reasonable isn't sufficient to let him walk, and the *jury* - not the prosecutor - got it right.
Bottom lne: Hans tried to bullshit them, and they saw through it. If he had shut his moutn, maybe he would have walked, but he thought he could "put one over" on a bunch of "dumb jurors."
He forgot that jurors don't have to be smarter than the accused - in his case, all they needed was a baloney-meter.
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Re:I can only hope (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:I can only hope (Score:5, Insightful)
Fixed that for you. Being a decent person has very little to do with religion.
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Re:So how many "But he's still innocent"... (Score:5, Insightful)
OK, here's a serious answer: his guilt or innocence does not, in any way, change the fact that he was convicted on scant evidence.
It's not the destination that matters, it's the journey. A broken system can send an innocent man to jail as easily as a guilty one.
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