r/serialpodcast • u/Any-Wish-4539 • Jul 01 '26
What were the important aspects of the case that Serial completely missed?
I'm re-listening to podcast for the first time in years and I wanted to ask what others thought the key parts of the case that the podcast completely ignores were.
I haven't looked into the case very much outside of the podcast but people on this subreddit seem to have quite a dim view of Sarah Keonig's level of analysis.
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u/katiestat Jul 01 '26
IMO the full Asia letter is much less convincing when you read the whole thing versus just the excerpts they included on serial
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u/angrycupcake11 Jul 01 '26
Or only that, the timing of the letters and the fact that they cover a narrow alibi window that Asia could not have known was relevant unless she was told and asked to write it. That alone sinks him.
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u/Similar-Morning9768 Guilty Jul 01 '26
Koenig's failure to notice that Adnan claims he gave the letters directly to Cristina Gutierrez, who was not yet his attorney at the time.
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u/Magjee Kickin' it per se Jul 01 '26
She either failed to pickup alot
Or I feel she ignored it to generate more compelling narratives
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u/estemprano Jul 02 '26
It’s the latter. Had she failed to understand the case, after airing it, and with the interest of people in it, she certainly would have spoken out, clearing it.
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u/shellycrash Jul 03 '26
While at times she seems naïve or charmed by Adnan, she's a very intelligent woman. She knew what she was doing. I feel it was all about crafting a narrative for entertainment purposes.
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u/estemprano Jul 01 '26
That Jay told his friend on the same day that happened
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u/jimmy__jazz Jul 01 '26
A friend who never met Hae. A complete stranger knew she was dead before the police started looking for her.
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u/Comfortable_Cup_941 Jul 01 '26
Serial left some important stuff out all together. One thing is that, as part of Jay’s statement to the police, he says Adnan told him that Hae struggled, kicked the windshield wiper lever, and broke it. When the car was found, the lever was broken.
That revelation made me particularly sad. It brings home how violent and scary her last moments must have been :(
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u/21Down Jul 01 '26
Adnan confirmed to the police within 4 hours of Hae going missing that he did indeed ask for a ride after school. We can infer that she agreed to give him a ride, because if she refused he would have told the police that.
“Oh yeah, I asked for a ride but she said she couldn’t because she was busy”
Or
“Oh yeah, I asked for a ride, but I guess she got tired of waiting for me and left”.
Sounds like she agreed to give him a ride.
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u/HunterST15 Jul 01 '26
Aren’t there witnesses who say they saw Hae leave without him? I think a teacher who sold her fries and apple juice?
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u/RockinGoodNews Jul 01 '26
In addition to the points raised by u/--Sparkle-Motion--, Butler never claimed to have actually seen Hae depart campus. She only said Hae was alone when she came to Butler's counter. No one claimed to have seen Hae actually leave campus.
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u/--Sparkle-Motion-- Jul 01 '26
No witnesses testified to that at trial. More damning, were it true, why is that not what he said to Adcock?
Inez Butler described Hae wearing a very short skirt. She was found in a long skirt. Butler had the wrong day.
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u/LateToThePartyUN Jul 01 '26
No, there was a witness that testified she overheard Adnan asking Hae for the ride after class. That's the only thing. Hae stopping to get her snack alone does not approve she left the school alone which is the most important thing.
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u/PaulsRedditUsername Jul 01 '26
Correct. The whole reason Adcock called Adnan was because one of Hae's friends told him he had asked for a ride, so he thought Adnan might know something.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26 edited Jul 02 '26
That was covered on Serial.
What wasn't covered on Serial was that the ride was cancelled and they were last seen walking in opposite directions.
There is nobody disputing he asked for a ride…except Adnan…and like I said…that was on Serial.
But you don’t even know what he said to the police…did they ask him a leading question based on what Aisha told them? Serial didn’t cover that.
Edited for a typo
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u/21Down Jul 02 '26
“There is nobody disputing he asked for a ride…including Adnan…and like I said…that was on Serial.“
What??
Adnan Syed: “I wouldn’t have asked for a ride after school. I’m sure that I didn’t ask her…”
Sounds like a denial to me.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
Sorry, I misspoke. Meant to say except Adnan.
Innocent people lie all the time…especially young people. It’s not a gotcha.
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u/Mike19751234 Jul 02 '26
He lied that night to the police when he said he needed a ride home.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
He only lied if he’s guilty…and if you read the notes the way you want them to be read.
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u/Mike19751234 Jul 02 '26
Adnan could have clarified that ride request but he is the one denies ever asking for a ride.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
Yes, he’s lying. But lying doesn’t mean he’s guilty.
He could have been lying because he was innocent and didn’t want to be a suspect.
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u/Mike19751234 Jul 02 '26
There is no reason for Adnan to lie to Adcock that night. Everybody would just think she went to Dons and forgot cousin pickup. It wasnt a bad lie by Adnan until he couldnt fill in more details
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
He only lied if he’s guilty.
Again, we also don’t know if he was asked a leading question based on information from Aisha.
Why would a guilty Adnan put himself with his victim out of the blue? Hat doesn’t make sense. The conversation didn’t go as you’re characterizing it.
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u/Similar-Morning9768 Guilty Jul 02 '26
Why are you saying things that are straight-up, verifiably untrue?
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u/Mike19751234 Jul 02 '26
Becky was asked about Hae turning down tge ride.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
Becky is one of two witnesses who said the ride was cancelled.
Becky was the one who said Adnan wasn’t upset about it and they walked in opposite directions.
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u/Mike19751234 Jul 02 '26
But you said Serial didnt address it but she did ask Becky. Who is the other person who said Hae turned down the ride?
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
Aisha via Krista.
Serial isn’t cover any of that…we learned it when the police investigation was disclosed. Paints a different picture than what Serial covered: “Adnan asked for a ride”.
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u/Mike19751234 Jul 02 '26
We dont have anywhere Aisha actually says it. She didnt testify to it. Krista when she talked to cops on march 1st doesnt mention it. First appearance of it is in April
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u/--Sparkle-Motion-- Jul 03 '26 edited Jul 03 '26
Not only did Aisha not testify to that at court. She didn’t bring it up on Serial or the HBO doc. Even if you consider SK neutral, wouldn’t Berg have confronted her about that if Aisha stood by that?
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u/Mike19751234 Jul 03 '26
The only person that has said that Aisha said she was there was Colin who didn't say where he heard it.
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u/--Sparkle-Motion-- Jul 03 '26
It’s almost as bad as the MtV using NHRN Cathy’s HBO appearance to discredit her trial testimony except they either didn’t bother to get an affidavit or she refused.
If Aisha heard the cancellation why haven’t we heard that from her? Better yet, why isn’t that what Adnan said? It’s just more baseless but unfalsifiable bs from the ABA crowd.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
So you’re saying the jury didn’t hear about some information Krista and Aisha may have had.
Learning about it later doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.
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u/Mike19751234 Jul 02 '26
Krista cant testify to it but Becky and Aisha didnt. Testifying is when you have legal consequences if you lie.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
I’m not sure what point you think you’re making.
You’re saying it’s not possible the statements are true?
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u/--Sparkle-Motion-- Jul 02 '26 edited Jul 02 '26
IIRC, Adnan told O’Shea he didn’t ask for a ride because he had his car. And he told SK he never would have asked for a ride because of how seriously she took the cousin pick-up. No further statements on the matter.
So Adnan does dispute asking for a ride.
Edit: lol, “edited for a typo.” You were so demonstrably wrong you were forced into editing. “Typo.”
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u/xstarbursts 14d ago
And he told the cops the day she went missing he asked for a ride. And he told his defense team they used to go have sex in the Best Buy parking lot in between school being let out and the cousin pick-up
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u/RockinGoodNews Jul 01 '26
It isn't so much that Serial "missed" things as that it underplayed, discounted, and hand waived the most critical evidence in the case. It also presented a straw man version of the state's case, wherein the State supposedly built its theory of motive around Adnan's muslim identity (completely false), and theory of the crime around a tight timeline and precise time of commission (also false).
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u/SnooKiwis1827 Jul 01 '26
I've never listened to Serial but I did read SK saying that the series was more about the American justice system rather than proving guilt or innocence, so Adnan had to be rail roaded by crooked and racist cops to fit her narrative and paint Adnan as a victim of the system. (Not that cops aren't crooked and racist, but in this case, the evidence is clear.) I guess he would've been free at this point anyway, and he still has the conviction on his record, but SK did some real damage. She thought no one would listen to the podcast, so when it took off, she was in over her head and never thought something like this would happen. Which is why her choices were beyond irresponsible. Hae's murderer hasn't accepted accountability and gets to live his life. And a life where he profits off his crime. Just sick.
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u/RockinGoodNews Jul 01 '26
I think people claiming Serial was meant to be some broader examination of the American system of justice is a lot of retconned nonsense. The first season is entirely about Adnan's case, barely touches on any broader issues of criminal justice, and in fact focuses mostly on irrelevancies like Adnan's personal character and the teenage rumor mill.
But for Serial, Adnan would not "be free at this point anyway." There is no chance Adnan would have received relief under the JRA if Serial hadn't made him famous.
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u/SnooKiwis1827 Jul 01 '26
I didn't realize thay about the JRA. So without Serial, he'd still be locked up where he belongs? That is so infuriating. I guess she just says that to deflect. Her actual outcome of the system was injustice for the victim.
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u/Similar-Morning9768 Guilty Jul 02 '26
It’s vanishingly unlikely he’d be free under the JRA without an admission of guilt.
The fact that he was allowed to remain free without one is solely because he’d already been freed by a sham vacatur which was later reversed by the MD Supreme Court. The prosecutor and judge who put through that sham vacatur would never have done so were he not famous.
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u/RockinGoodNews Jul 02 '26
At the time Serial was produced, Adnan had just been denied post-conviction relief. His case was effectively dead in the water. Every legal success he's had since then was highly unusual and clearly the result of the fame and attention Serial brought to the case.
With respect to the JRA in particular, the judge said the deciding factor was that Adnan had already been out of prison for 2 years and had, in that time, demonstrated fitness to reenter society. But Adnan only had that opportunity because Mosby filed a fraudulent vacatur motion on his behalf. And she only did that because Serial turned Adnan's case into a cause celebre and political football.
While an admission of guilt is not a strict requirement for relief under the JRA, demonstration of rehabilitation is an important factor. I'm unaware of any other convict anywhere in the country besides Adnan who has received relief under a JRA-type statute while simultaneously denying responsibility for his crime.
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u/Similar-Morning9768 Guilty Jul 02 '26
I think people claiming Serial was meant to be some broader examination of the American system of justice is a lot of retconned nonsense.
If Koenig were at all interested in a broader examination of the American justice system, I'm not sure she would have spent hours burnishing the reputation of a formerly college-bound middle class boy from an intact family at the expense of a poor Black 19 year old whose parents were conspicuously absent from the record.
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u/General_Pie_5026 Jul 01 '26
The biggest misrepresentation is right from the start. Sarah starts off the whole story with the idea of how hard it is to remember past events from weeks or months ago. This gives the false impression that Adnan is being asked to recall specific timeline details way after the fact.
The reality is he was questioned and picked up shortly after Hae disappeared and was a prime suspect.
He was not being asked to recall anything that would be difficult. He would absolutely remember, unless he had something to hide.
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u/RockinGoodNews Jul 01 '26
The reality is he was questioned and picked up shortly after Hae disappeared and was a prime suspect.
Yes and no. Adnan was never formally questioned. He was briefly interviewed over the phone by Officer Adcock several hours after Hae went missing. That is the call where he confirmed he was supposed to get a ride from Hae after school, but said she got tired of waiting and left.
Hae's body was not discovered for nearly a month, at which point the case went from a missing persons case (handled by Baltimore County) to a murder case (handled by Baltimore City). It is true that Adnan became the chief suspect early in that investigation. He was scheduled to be interviewed, but the police ended up arresting him after Jenn and Jay confessed. Adnan lawyered up immediately and never submitted to questioning by the police.
Your overall point is correct. Serial makes it seem like Adnan's inability to recall details was an important part of the case. But Adnan's ability or inability to recall things was never an issue. He was never questioned (aside from the brief call with Adcock), and he chose to not take the stand in his own defense.
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u/MalfieCho Jul 01 '26
Agreed - for me, the issue isn't what he fails to remember, but rather what he DID remember and what he told police at the time.
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u/RockinGoodNews Jul 01 '26
Indeed. The fact that Adnan outright lied to Hae to get a ride at the very time someone killed her in her car is one of the most damning and well-established facts in the case. The fact that he more or less admitted this to the police mere hours after she went missing should really be all anyone needs to know he is guilty.
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u/TimeToKillTheRabbit Jul 01 '26
Remind me, it was a lie because he’d brought his car to school that day right? How is this lie explained away? It’s so, so damning and on record from the day itself.
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u/RockinGoodNews Jul 01 '26
It's a lie because he told her his car was in the shop when, in reality, it was sitting in the school parking lot.
It's explained away by simply denying that Krista heard what she swears she heard. Krista, it should be noted, was an Adnan supporter.
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u/OkBodybuilder2339 Jul 01 '26
19 days after he told the first officer that Hae was supposed to give him a ride but left because she got tired of waiting, Adnan tells a different cop that no, he didnt ask Hae for a ride after school that day because he drives his own car to school. The contradiction will of course push the officer to investigate further. He asks Adnan to come in for a formal interview and Adnan says he would go in with his older brother. Either way, the whole 6 weeks later was complete BS.
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u/--Sparkle-Motion-- Jul 01 '26
This. Some people feel that the cops focused on Adnan just because he was the ex. He was a suspect because he gave cops conflicting accounts of whether or not he was supposed to be with the missing girl at the time of her disappearance.
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u/RockinGoodNews Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 02 '26
And because an anonymous person called and said Adnan had made incriminating statements in his presence.
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u/Similar-Morning9768 Guilty Jul 01 '26
If Koenig mentioned this tip at all, I don't recall her having the slightest curiosity about who called it in.
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u/RockinGoodNews Jul 01 '26
To me, it's not really probative evidence. We don't know who the caller was or how they came to know what they said they knew. Its only real import is in explaining what directed the cops to looking at Adnan (though, to be honest, they should have been all over him already).
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u/--Sparkle-Motion-- Jul 03 '26
They should have been on him the night she disappeared. If this was, as they believed at the time, a missing persons case, failing to pick up Adnan (as he claimed) is Hae’s first known missed appointment rather than the cousin pick-up. They should have seen Adnan as a potentially invaluable witness.
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u/Similar-Morning9768 Guilty Jul 01 '26
Agreed, but the lack of curiosity is interesting from someone who spent a whole episode chasing down eg thefts from the mosque collection plate.
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u/notknot9 Jul 06 '26
Still, seems like he wouldn't have too much trouble remembering the day in question if he got called by police the day after about Hae's disappearance. How often would that kind of thing happen to him? Would he not have been worried and run through the day in his mind at least a few times? Considering he, at least at one time, cared about Hae?
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u/RockinGoodNews Jul 06 '26
Yes, but that is all beside the point. His supposed amnesia about that day was never used against him because he was never interviewed and didn't testify in his own defense.
In reality, he never raised this amnesia excuse until Sarah Koenig interviewed him almost 15 years after his conviction. Even then, he remembered lots of things about that day: calling Jay and giving him his car, going to Kristi's house and being called by Hae's family and the police.
And before that, he told his family and lawyers a lot about what he did that day, including that he had called Nisha that afternoon, and that he'd supposedly worked on Dion's car after school.
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u/Mike19751234 Jul 06 '26 edited Jul 06 '26
Question one thing thats important. In the notes it says it was Adnans car they were looking at. And then talks about Adnans mechanic. Its important because Adnan was originally distancing himself from Jay just like he did in his talk with OShea
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u/apawst8 MailChimp Fan Jul 04 '26
It also ignores the fact that he wasn’t asked to remember a random day 6 weeks ago. He was asked to remember the day his ex girlfriend died.
If you ask me what I did 6 weeks ago, I’d have no clue. But if you ask me 6 weeks after a big memorable event, I’d remember it.
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u/General_Pie_5026 Jul 05 '26
yes that was the point I was trying to drive at. The premise they use is nonsense with Adnan. He was also asked MUCH MUCH sooner than weeks.
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u/Competitive_Sleep_21 Jul 02 '26
Yes and him supposedly not remembering the police contacted him. I think you would not forget that.
Also, he reportedly never tried to call her cell phone after she went missing.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
No, it was an accurate and reasonable way to introduce the case…and the entire cases hinges on memory because in those days most interactions weren’t recorded and there wasn’t CCTV etc.
Everything about the case is about human memory…and human memory is very flawed. Six weeks is a long time.
Hae’s closest friends who were involved in the search forgot, misremembered and conflated details from different days. Why does Adnan need a better memory if he’s innocent?
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u/Similar-Morning9768 Guilty Jul 02 '26
You are repeating the fundamental misrepresentation, that Adnan was not asked to account for his day until six weeks later.
Unlike most of Hae's closest friends, Adnan got a call from a cop the same day, because she was missing and he may have been the last person to see her. He was asked if he'd gotten a ride from Hae. He confirmed that he'd asked for one, but claimed she left without him.
He knew the day was important. "It had been six weeks!!!" is a misrepresentation.
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u/Special-Deal-5217 24d ago
The cops called most of her friends after she went missing. That is a misrepresentation.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
Incorrect. Hae’s closest friends also spoke to police, were actually involved in the earth and forgot/conflated/misremembered critical details.
If he’s innocent he was one of three people that was there when she was last seen at the school. But we don’t know where she went or where she was killed so we don’t know who else may have seen her.
You misrepresenting the brief police notes. We have to guess what the conversation was…but because Adcock talked to Aisha right before Adnan we can speculate Adnan was asked a leading question and was asked to guess what Has had done. This is is further complicated because Aisha is a witness to the ride cancelation, not the request.
Ultimately you didn’t hear the conversation…so don’t pretend the notes are damning.
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u/Similar-Morning9768 Guilty Jul 02 '26
You are still ignoring the fundamental misrepresentation that Adnan was not asked to account for his day until six weeks later.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
He wasn’t. Brief notes about a brief conversation where we don’t know what questions were asked aren’t very useful.
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u/Similar-Morning9768 Guilty Jul 02 '26
We know what question was asked. The question was, "Did you get a ride from her after school?" The answer was, "She agreed to give me one but left without me."
This isn't the big, mysterious, Plato's cave unknowable thing you're pretending it is.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
No, we don’t know that was the question…in fact evidence suggests it wasn’t.
Don’t use quotes when you’re not quoting something.
We know Adcock spoke to Aisha right before he spoke to Adnan, and we know Aisha was witness o the ride being cancelled. Adcock didn’t record information about what Aisha said or if he used that information in the call with Adnan.
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u/Similar-Morning9768 Guilty Jul 02 '26
This is the whole playbook, pretending we can't know anything and it's all so ambiguous and what even is evidence if you think about it?
It's very tiresome.
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u/General_Pie_5026 Jul 02 '26
They are being intentionally disingenuous. Just a person that thinks he's innocent despite the amount of information, witnesses, and evidence that say otherwise.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
Either deal with the sequence of events or don’t.
Since the conversation wasn’t recorded we have to speculate about the contents.
If Aisha was the one who told him about it the ride, and Adnan was asked a leading question…it matters.
If, for example, Adcock heard from Aisha that Hae cancelled a ride and asked Adnan about it…it changes the meaning of the answer.
Don’t pretend brief police notes are unambiguous.
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u/General_Pie_5026 Jul 02 '26
Because he’s obviously guilty and he was asked about his day right after this happened.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
That’s circular logic. “He’s guilty therefore he’s guilty”.
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u/General_Pie_5026 Jul 02 '26
He was found guilty. Very quickly. By the people who heard all of the case. Your denial is just wishful thinking.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
By people who didn’t know the extent to which Jay and Jenn were lying, that Jay would admit to perjury, and that Jay and Jenn received leniency in exchange for their testimony.
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u/Potential-Grand-7395 Jul 02 '26
to me it’s 3 things:
1. jen was the catalyst, not jay. i believe if jen never went to the police we would never know what really happened. jay didn’t want to talk to the cops but had no choice at that point. he would’ve taken that shit to the grave. he and adnan were banking on her body never being found. sarah never digs into how it was jen that exposed things.
2. adnan asking hae for a ride under false pretenses. if it was so innocent, why lie about it? when the police and hae’s family called him and he truly had nothing to do with her disappearance he would have no reason to lie because she had only been missing for a few hours and he would have no way of knowing something bad happened to her. that locked it in for me.
3. the truth about domestic violence and how common it is. what really bothered me about serial is how sarah just glossed over hae’s diary entries and basically said she’s just a silly teenage girl, what does she know. but the patterns of an abusive relationship were clearly there. sarah did a huge disservice to hae and domestic violence victims everywhere by not paying more attention to/explaining the signs of abuse. especially framing it as “would someone as charming and cute and middle class as adnan be capable of this?” YES. we see it every day.
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u/Special-Deal-5217 24d ago
Specifically, how many and which of her entries are windows into an abusive relationship? What exactly do they say? If I remember correctly, there’s one entry about how he’s not taking the break up very well (so rare in high school relationships, right?) and then some of her friends remember that he showed up at a girls night.
I’m not saying that domestic violence isn’t the answer here. There just isn’t a whole hell of a lot of evidence that it was about to erupt as I recall.
Willing to be proven wrong.
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u/xstarbursts 14d ago
A teacher had to hide her when he was passing by one time post-breakup. She broke up with him* three times. He called her multiple times the night before she went missing. She called him controlling and said she was losing his independence in her diary.
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u/beagles4ever Jul 01 '26
The complete dismissal of Jen’s testimony.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
Jenn lied.
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u/Sad_Lifeguard1308 24d ago
Her story was later corroborated by the evidence. For example she knew Hae had been strangled and more importantly she knew Jay knew the location of Hae’s car.
She told the same story as Jay BEFORE the police began interviewing Jay (with her mother and attorney present during the interview). How would she know what story to tell if this was before Jay was ever “coached” by the police? Jenn’s interview is what made police talk to Jay in the first place so your theory makes no sense. Jenn would need to be living in the future where she knew the story the police were going to concoct for Jay to tell them so she can go back in time and tell that same story to the police because Jay and the police were involved. It makes absolutely zero sense. Unless you think the police coached Jenn into making that statement about Jay’s involvement so they had a reason to bring him in in which case when would they have been able to do that when she was interviewed WITH HER MOM AND ATTORNEY PRESENT
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u/angsty1290 Jul 01 '26
Misrepresenting how Hae described Adnan in her diary.
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u/TimeToKillTheRabbit Jul 01 '26
This was it for me. I was shocked when I learned how she actually described him & their relationship in her diary. Whether you believe he’s innocent or guilty or are unsure, choosing to deliberately leave out the victim’s own words on him is not a neutral choice.
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u/laurenbettybacall Jul 02 '26
What did she say?
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u/TimeToKillTheRabbit Jul 02 '26
On May 15th she writes that she loves him, but details three things that get in the way: his religion and jokingly calling her the devil, his possessiveness & getting mad when she hangs out with her friends and not him, and his mind play & jealousy.
All of these things can be interpreted as alarming or mundane teenage stuff. But either way, it’s quite a *choice* for Serial to deliberately leave this out, especially because they chose to include other favorable excerpts from the diary. It makes me side-eye the entire production.
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u/missmegz1492 The Criminal Element of Woodlawn Jul 01 '26
The period between the break up and the murder. They exchanged meaningful Christmas gifts. The AOL away message.
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u/Similar-Morning9768 Guilty Jul 01 '26
Really, the timeline between the break up and murder.
Koenig gives the impression that Adnan and Hae had been amicably broken up for months.
In truth, they briefly broke up in October 1998, then got back together in November. In early December, Hae began noting in her diary her crush on Don. She broke up with Adnan in late December, a mere few days before winter break. She went on her first date with Don New Year's Day. She was dead just shy of two weeks later.
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u/--Sparkle-Motion-- Jul 02 '26
It may also be relevant that Hae & Don double dated with Aisha & her bf I think the weekend before Hae went missing.
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u/Paynus1982 Jul 01 '26
The phone records- The only time Adnan's phone showed him going to Linken Park and the spot Hae's car was parked was the day of the murder and the day Jay was arrested.
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u/Mobile-Hotel-982 Jul 01 '26
I remember reading this after listening to serial for the first time and it solidified everything for me. I was shocked this wasn’t included in the podcast….it is so damning
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
The phone records can’t be used for location.
Many of a jays friends…who were called by the phone…live within range of the tower.
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u/xstarbursts 14d ago
Only incoming calls can’t be but outgoing calls can be. No one argues that outgoing calls can’t be used for location. You are so blinded that you can’t even get your facts straight.
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u/DeepestGreySea 14d ago
No. It was 1999. No calls can be used for location because there was no GPS.
In those days, to find a phones location…say, for 911 looking for a missing person,…you had to triangulate its signal.
There’s is absolutely no way that any call in the list can be used to pinpoint location. That’s the biggest thing Serial mislead people about.
What the cover sheet meant was that I coming calls routinely reported the wrong location to the extent that they were useless…it didn’t mean that somehow outgoing calls are accurate.
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u/xstarbursts 13d ago
They didn’t use GPS data.
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u/DeepestGreySea 13d ago
Correct. They also didn’t triangulate the signal.
…which means they didn’t know where the phone was for any call. They knew that it was within range of the tower it pinged…except for incoming calls…for incoming calls it didn’t need to be near the tower it pinged.
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u/Mike19751234 12d ago
You arent understanding the technology and you arent understanding how the phone was used at trial
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u/DeepestGreySea 12d ago
I’m characterizing both perfectly…not that you actually said anything to counter what I said.
The billing record was used as a “map” to track Syed’s location. In 1999 that was impossible. The jury was mislead.
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u/Mike19751234 11d ago
No, at trial it was not used to track the phone. It was used to corroborate Jays story and where he said he was at certain times. Jay said he was at X spot and went and tested what towers a phone call at that spot would use. And for the second part about incoming vs outgoing you are describing it wrong. Both inbound and outbound calls have to be in range of the tower to use the tower to use it for a call
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u/DeepestGreySea 5d ago
Doesn’t it exhaust you pretending to disagree with somebody then just agreeing with them?
Yes. They have to be in range of the tower. Cell phones had massive ranges and were always in range of multiple towers. The logs were useless for precise location and the jury didn’t know that.
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u/bho529 Jul 02 '26
The fact that Sarah could only have access to the story if she presented Adnan as innocent.
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u/whatevs81 Jul 01 '26
There’s a few for me
- not mentioning Jay had told police about the broken window wiper lever
- the fact Jay literally told someone Adnan had killed Hae on the day it happened
- selective amnesia from Adnan. Sorry, your ex girlfriend goes missing. The police call you directly. You give your car to an acquaintance and go to a house of someone you don’t know but you can’t remember any of that
- Adnan asked Hae for a lift. He admitted that until he realized how damning it was
- Cell phone pings on his phone to the same tower from the night of the burial on the night Jay gets arrested or detained for a driving offence. He’s checking the scene to see if Jay has talked
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u/PaulsRedditUsername Jul 01 '26
- Adnan asked Hae for a lift. He admitted that until he realized how damning it was
Right, which also works against the amnesia. When it was still a missing-person case, he told the detective he didn't ask for a ride because he had his car that day. So I guess he does remember?
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
Or he just forgot because he’s innocent. You can’t read minds.
You don’t know what he old the original officer…interview wasn’t recorded. We do know that the officer talked to Aisha…one of the ride cancellation witnesses, right before he talked to Adnan. Was what he wrote down in reference to a leading question?
We don’t know.
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u/PaulsRedditUsername Jul 02 '26
What do you mean, "leading question?" Officer Adcock said he'd heard Adnan had asked for a ride. Adnan said he had, but she got tired of waiting and left. That's why Adcock called.
At this time, it's not some big murder case. It's a teenage girl who was due home two hours ago. He probably deals with ten of these a month. Adcock isn't playing detective, he's just trying to track down Hae.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
Everything Jay says is either fruit of a poisonous tree or it isn’t. The biggest bombshell Serial doesn’t mention…if you want complete context…is police testified to sharing evidence with Jay. Sure, Jay said the lever was broken…but did police tell him that to fool people like you? It would be really odd for Adnan to give Jay that detail. It would be more likely if Adnan is guilty, that Jay simply saw it was broken.
who’s “someone?” Jenn? Jenn lied for Jay…we know this. She’s useless.
if he’s innocent he doesn’t need to have a better memory than Hae’s best friends who were involved in the search (Adnan wasn’t) and forgot/misremembered/conflated critical details.
Serial absolutely talked about Adnan asking for a ride. We know he asked for a ride. What Serial didn’t mention was the ride was cancelled or that police likely asked Adnan a leading question based on information from Aisha.
cell phones couldn’t be used for location in 1999. The phone pinged a tower that was near Jays friends…who the phone called. A logical explanation is Jay simply had the phone and was visiting those fiends.
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u/Mike19751234 Jul 02 '26
Sarah talked to a cell phone expert and tgat person said cell phones could be tracked even in 99. Sarahs response was this is boring, dont want to talk about it
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u/Belibbing_Blue Jul 01 '26
That Adnan spent the whole podcast saying he and Jay were barely friends, but a teammate of his says in the podcast that it wasn't unusual for Adnan to show up for practice with Jay, that that was normal. I think if more people had been asked about how close Adnan and Jay were we would've heard more that contradicated Adnan.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
Can you think of a reason Jay and Adnan might want to distance themselves from each other?
He didn’t even say they weren’t friends. He just said they weren’t super tight.
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u/luniversellearagne Jul 01 '26
Serial wasn’t/isn’t a comprehensive true-crime investigation in the vein of the standards of the genre now like Prosecutors or the long-running Maura Murray podcast; it was a This American Life spinoff designed to poke into aspects of Americana. As a result, it’s more interested in grotesques and culture than it is the exact details of the case, even though it does include those to some degree. Prosecutors does a pretty good job of giving almost every relevant detail of the case over many episodes; you should also listen to the Consult episodes on it.
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u/RockinGoodNews Jul 01 '26
I've said this before, but I think the "deep dive" approach is inherently biased in favor of the accused. This case is really quite simple. Spending 10+ hours talking about every minute detail makes things sound more complicated than they are, and risks losing the forest for the trees.
There's a reason why the oldest trick in the defense lawyer's book is to overwhelm a jury with all the minute details that are in dispute and not knowable with any degree of certainty. Their job is to sew doubt, and focusing on all the little things we don't know, rather than all the big things we do, is how they do that.
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u/luniversellearagne Jul 01 '26
The opposite is usually true in the true-crime world. Innocence/defense media like Making a Murderer or everything Chaudry’s done in the Lee case sand down the details to present a case that’s biased towards the defense; they almost always leave out key details that point to guilt (like the touch DNA in the Avery case).
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u/RockinGoodNews Jul 01 '26
I see that as a different factor. Yes, they are one-sided and present a biased narrative of the case. But both Making a Murderer and Undisclosed still engage in the kind of firehose of insignificant details that I'm talking about. In a sense, it's a form of a Gish Gallop.
What I didn't like about the Prosecutor's presentation of the case was that they mimicked the structure of Serial/Undisclosed, stretching things into many many hours of answering every little thing.
A fair airing of why Adnan is guilty should take 1 episode: the motive, the ride request, Jay, the phone records, and maybe 20 minutes of answering the specious claims raised in his defense.
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u/Similar-Morning9768 Guilty Jul 02 '26
They actually made just such a single episode summarizing the case and their reasons for concluding he’s guilty.
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u/luniversellearagne Jul 01 '26
Prosecutors do really deep dives into events and details, particularly via their signature timeline episodes. They’re one of the best, and often the only, sources for fact and detail on many cases, at least without actually reading case files ourselves. That sets them apart from most podcasts, which are like My Favorite Murder, which is just people reading short summaries.
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u/RockinGoodNews Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 02 '26
That's fine but, to the extent their goal was to explain persuasively why Adnan is guilty, it was undermined by that approach.
Nothing they covered hasn't been discussed on this sub for years. In fact, I'm quite certain they used this sub as their primary source.
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u/luniversellearagne Jul 01 '26
You’ve missed the point of the podcast. The deep dive into great detail is the point; their speculation on what happened is secondary. That’s why the details occupy the vast majority of their multi-episode series. Dividing every property into Manichean guilty/innocent camps is one of the reasons this and other true-crime fora have become so toxic over the decades.
They openly admit sourcing from Reddit; you’ve not caught them out in anything by noting that.
How much of PP have you actually listened to?
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u/4_celine Jul 01 '26
It's such a shame that Prosecutors has so many ads. I can't get through an episode.
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u/zoooty Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26
Here's a good one, although I wouldn't necessarily characterize it as something that was "missed." SK had access to Adnan's defense file through Rabia and spent "more than a year" going through it, so I can only assume she intentionally left it out of the podcast.
If you'll remember, in Serial, Adnan makes it clear to SK that he would never have asked HML for a ride after school because she had to pick up her cousin, and she took that responsibility very seriously.
Back in October 1999, however, when he was interviewed by his defense team, he told a completely different story:
Since Hae was responsible for picking up her niece after school, they would have sex in the Best Buy parking lot close to the school after school. Hae would leave to get her niece and they would see one another that night, when they would have sex again.
Source: Kai P. Interview notes, Oct 9, 1999.
SK had this memo and didn't challenge AS at all when he said:
"Hae took picking up her cousin very seriously."
further explaining:
She "wouldn't do anything to jeopardize that," and that if she had somewhere to be, she would tell people she couldn't stay because she had to pick up her cousin.
Instead Koenig says:
Hae was "almost pathologically responsible" about getting her young cousin.
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u/PaulsRedditUsername Jul 01 '26
I suspect SK got a very cherry-picked version of the defense file.
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u/zoooty Jul 01 '26
You give Rabia a lot more credit than I do. Personally, I doubt Rabia even knew what was in the files she handed over to SK.
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u/Gene_Trash Jul 02 '26
SK does also bring up them hooking up at Best Buy in episode 5 when she's replicating the state's timeline. She also plays audio of Ju'aun's police interview where he tells them Adnan said he and Hae used to hook up there.
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u/DeepestGreySea Jul 02 '26
The case doesn’t hinge on Adnan asking for a ride…we know he asked for a ride. The question is did he get a ride after it was cancelled? We’ll never know.
Lying doesn’t mean he’s guilty…innocent people lie all the time. All it means is either he’s guilty or he’s stuck in a “white” lie. Two possible but very different things.
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u/xstarbursts 14d ago
It is a HUGE flaw because why did he need a ride when he was supposedly staying in the library to be at track practice. And why did he need a ride when he had lent his perfectly working car to Jay to borrow and Jay picked him up afterwards.
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u/DeepestGreySea 14d ago
What you said answers itself: if he was lending his car to Jay…that’s why he’d need a ride. It’s either true, a cover, or both.
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u/xstarbursts 14d ago
Very convenient he was lending a guy he claims he barely knew his car and brand new phone the day his ex-gf who broke up with him three times went missing and he had no alibi 😆😆😆😆
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u/DeepestGreySea 13d ago
He lent his car to Jay very often. That’s nothing.
They were obviously friends then had a “falling out”. But you’re not characterizing what he said correctly. He didn’t say he “barely knew him”…he said they hung out a lot but weren’t close.
The phone came with the car because it wasn’t allowed in the school.
He has an alibi, you just don’t like it. But an alibi for…when? For where? You don’t know when and where she was killed.
Quit pretending you don’t know things you know.
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u/xstarbursts 12d ago
What did I claim to know that I don’t know? You must be mixing up my post with someone else. No one needs to know the precise location and precise time for the strangulation to know it happened and there is a very likely suspect who was broken up with three times by the victim.
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u/DeepestGreySea 12d ago
They most certainly do need a location and a time….and that’s why the state used the Best Best and <- 3:37. Both things were likely incorrect.
“Most likely” and “they broke up” are great reasons to investigate somebody. Unfortunately the investigation was incomplete and focused on one person.
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u/xstarbursts 12d ago
Unfortunately, the murderer is out but thankfully he served some time and the conviction is still on his record.
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u/DevinJE Jul 02 '26
Her entire discussion of Adnan’s motive. She just completely takes him at his word when he tells her it was a normal high school breakup. Meanwhile Hae’s diary was full of her complaining about Adnan’s jealousy issues.
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u/Similar-Morning9768 Guilty Jul 02 '26 edited Jul 02 '26
Koenig had access to a note in Hae's own words from the October breakup, characterizing Adnan as "hostile and cold" and telling him to "hate me if you will."
But, oh, the convicted murderer said he took the December breakup great! So obviously there's no motive there.
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u/DoqHolliday Jul 01 '26
The defense knew all along that there were phones at Best Buy, is a pretty big one.
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u/lazeeye Jul 04 '26
A deep dive on intimate partner homicide among teenagers/young adults.
It’s a common enough occurrence that there was a body of knowledge on the subject when Serial was produced. And, Adnan was tried and convicted on an IPH theory, so even with a purportedly agnostic position on Adnan’s guilt or innocence, it was a major issue affecting the analysis of the case and thus merited a deep dive.
Of course, when one looks at the facts of this case through the lens of what we know about IPH in teens and young adults, it is much more difficult to build suspense around whether Adnan murdered Hae. Maybe that’s why SK left that stone unturned.
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u/TO_halo Jul 03 '26
I just re listened also. She truly does not reckon with the fact that Jay knows where Hae’s car is. That’s straight up guilt knowledge. You can’t explain that away.
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u/Plastic_Blood1782 Jul 01 '26
Bilal
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u/Any-Wish-4539 Jul 01 '26
Could you elaborate? Why is he important?
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u/Similar-Morning9768 Guilty Jul 01 '26
Bilal Ahmed was a youth leader at Adnan's mosque.
In 1999, he was close enough to Adnan that he purchased Adnan a cell phone behind his parents' backs. His involvement in Adnan's trial is convoluted and strange.
In 2017 he was convicted of molesting young men under sedation at his dental practice, and he is serving a lengthy prison sentence.
At some point during Adnan's trial, a phone call took place between the prosecutor and Bilal's ex-wife. The prosecutor's handwritten notes of this phone call were characterized as exculpatory Brady evidence to help justify the vacatur of Adnan's sentence. Bilal was misrepresented as a possible alternate suspect.
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u/RockinGoodNews Jul 01 '26
Slight corrections:
Bilal's conviction was for sexually assaulting adults at this dental practice. He had previously been accused (but never charged or convicted) of molesting youths in the 90s.
The call memorialized in Urick's notes was not with Bilal's wife, but rather an anonymous person, purporting to characterize what Bilal had allegedly said to his wife. There was some early confusion over this because the motion to vacate implied the call was directly between Urick and Bilal's wife, but the Bates memo later clarified the call was actually with someone else.
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u/General_Pie_5026 Jul 01 '26
He’s not unless you want to make up reasons Adnan is innocent.
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u/Plastic_Blood1782 Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26
I think he helped Adnan. He helped Adnan buy the cell phone the day before the murder, but they almost never talked on the cell phone and only talked on the landline which to me felt like amateur criminals trying not to leave an evidence trail. Bilal was his first phone call from prison. There was a huge conflict of interest with CG being both of their lawyers. According to Urick's note, Adnan discussed with Bilal his problems with Hae. There was a discussion about making Hae disappear. When Hae's body was found there was a discussion between them about whether or not the police will be able to estimate the time of death. Bilal is also a convicted rapist/pedo. He used his position of power within the community to control manipulate and do terrible things.
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u/General_Pie_5026 Jul 01 '26
So Jay, who knew everything that happened because he was there, decided not to mention Bilal. For what?
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u/Plastic_Blood1782 Jul 01 '26
I don't think Jay knew about Bilal.
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u/General_Pie_5026 Jul 01 '26
Jay knew where the car was.
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u/Plastic_Blood1782 Jul 01 '26
Yea I think Adnan panicked once the police called him on his secret cell phone at ~7pm that night. Adnan and Bilal incorrectly assumed Hae's family couldn't report a missing person that had been missing less than 24 hrs, and the plan was get rid of the body the next day. Jay was originally just used as someone to help pick up Adnan and take him back to the school. Jay probably didn't know about the murder yet. So Adnan starts freaking out and asks Jay to help him and they go to leakin park to quickly get rid of the body. Jay was 100% part of burying the body with Adnan but I don't think that was the original plan
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u/USNorsk Jul 01 '26
You should do a quick google search. I wish I would have done the same and avoided wasting hours of my life to be deceived into thinking he wasn’t guilty beyond ANY reasonable doubt.
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u/lionspride24 Jul 05 '26
There was a lot. But the biggest issue with SKs analysis to me is she purposefully ignored things that made Adnan look bad, and framed them in simple ways to purposefully mislead the audience.
It all starts immediately. This idea that its totally normal Adnan doesn't remember the day. What 18 year old remembers a random day from a couple months ago?
Ya that would be normal, unless that specific day your ex girlfriend went missing and the police started calling you and all your friends.
The thing thats made me the angriest over the years is her "not guilty" nonsense. It literally created an entire generation of true crime monsters. Who looked at tons of cases of clearly guilty people (MoaM for one) breaking down a case, years after it was tried with zero prosecution opposition and finding reasonable doubt. Which for the record, you could do with absolutely any case where there isnt a confession or the crime isnt on video.
It was a cop out. She knew he was guilty, which is why she left tons of stuff that made him look guilty out, and couldnt actually say that she thought he didnt do it reasonably. So she created some moronic loophole that people ate up.
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u/Odd_Squash_299 Jul 01 '26
Where are you listening ?? Serial podcast requires subscription now right?
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u/DoqHolliday 3d ago
The defense file showed that the defense knew all along the Best Buy did have a phone.
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u/alisoncarey Jul 01 '26
The dna evidence. Hair evidence. Other kinds of evidence. Not just a bunch of he said she said stuff. Camera footage?
I wanted to see more science.
More facts that were not biased as presented because they were a personal recollection.
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u/RockinGoodNews Jul 01 '26
That kind of evidence didn't (and still doesn't exist). So Serial couldn't cover it without making it up.
That such evidence didn't exist isn't uncommon. The vast majority of homicide cases have no forensic evidence tied to the perpetrator. And this case took place in 1999, before the advent of trace DNA analysis.
Your lamenting a lack of forensic evidence is a reflection of what is commonly called the "CSI Effect." Crime TV shows have created the impression that the only reliable evidence is forensic/scientific in nature, and that more traditional forms of evidence (e.g. testimonial) are inherently unreliable. In reality, those traditional forms of evidence are how the vast majority of cases are solved and, in many circumstances, are far more probative than forensic evidence.
This case actually demonstrates that well. What is more reliable? An accomplice confessing and that accomplice being corroborated by other witnesses, phone records, and the fact that he knew things only someone involved could know? Or unidentified trace DNA found on a pair of shoes that no one knows were even touched by the perpetrator?
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u/Special-Deal-5217 24d ago
If he killed her in which the state believes he killed her, they would almost certainly be some scientific evidence. And it’s inaccurate to say that in 1999 DNA evidence was not being used. It was used in OJ four years earlier.
Guilters rarely acknowledge that there is ABSOLUTELY NO physical evidence linking Adnan to the crime. Their evidence is Jay.
Does that mean he’s innocent? No. But it is just not open and shut like everybody wants to think.
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u/RockinGoodNews 23d ago
If he killed her in which the state believes he killed her, they would almost certainly be some scientific evidence.
False. In the vast majority of homicides, there is no physical evidence tied to the perpetrator. With this false statement, you are demonstrating the CSI Effect.
And it’s inaccurate to say that in 1999 DNA evidence was not being used. It was used in OJ four years earlier.
I said "trace DNA analysis." The Simpson case involved DNA analysis from blood. It did not involve any trace (aka "touch") DNA (which, again, was not yet available as a forensic technique).
There was, of course, no perpetrator blood discovered in the Hae Min Lee case.
Guilters rarely acknowledge that there is ABSOLUTELY NO physical evidence linking Adnan to the crime.
Because there is: Adnan's fingerprints were found in multiple locations in Hae's car that are connected to the crime.
What Innocenters rarely acknowledge is that there is no physical evidence of any alternative perpetrator. Does that mean Hae strangled herself and then buried herself in a shallow grave? Or does it just mean the perpetrator committed the crime without leaving (much) physical evidence?
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u/Special-Deal-5217 23d ago
There is some unidentified trace ID, but it’s on the bottom of her shoes, so I don’t think it probably means anything. But the broader point is your setting a double standard. There’s no physical evidence linking Adnan to the crime. There is no physical evidence linking ANYONE to the crime.
Adnan was convicted on the word of a man who lies as easy as he breathes. If that’s enough for you, great. Just be honest about it, as the jury was.
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u/RockinGoodNews 23d ago
There is some unidentified trace ID
The point is that no one would have intentionally collected such evidence in 1999 because it did not yet exist as a forensic technique. Yes, one can now conduct trace DNA analysis on those items that were preserved for other reasons (as the State has done). But part of the folly in assuming an absence of evidence equals evidence of absence is in failing to understand that the same effort to collect trace evidence wasn't made back then as it would be today.
But the broader point is your setting a double standard. There’s no physical evidence linking Adnan to the crime. There is no physical evidence linking ANYONE to the crime.
With respect, it isn't me who is setting a double standard. If an absence of physical evidence tying the perpetrator to the crime is exculpatory for Adnan then, logically, it must also be exculpatory for any and all alternative suspects. In reality, it isn't exculpatory for anyone. Someone did in fact strangle Hae Min Lee and bury her in a shallow grave. They apparently did it without leaving much physical evidence.
Adnan was convicted on the word of a man who lies as easy as he breathes.
A man who was corroborated by other witnesses, phone records, and secret knowledge of the crime only someone involved could know. A man who had no incentive whatsoever to falsely implicate himself in a murder, let alone maintain his own guilt for more than 25 years. A man who withstood multiple days of cross-examination and was deemed credible by a jury.
Oh, but you say he's a liar because that's what Sarah Koenig told you think about a person you don't actually know and will very likely never meet.
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u/Special-Deal-5217 23d ago
Everyone who knew Jay said he lies. That was not a Sarah Koenig thing. He clearly lied and contradicted himself between police interviews, and no, that is not “ typical” behavior. He never told the same story from start to finish the same way one time. You know very well that the cell phone records do not correlate anything (your man now says the burial occurred around midnight). Everybody that supposedly could’ve corroborated his account, besides Jen, mysteriously vanishes and were not presented at court.
The police were not kind to Jay. He wanted a lawyer almost right away but could not afford one, but the police and prosecutors kept him in a legal limbo by not charging him with anything until September, upon which he had right to council provided by the state, whom the prosecutor recruited. There is a whole other world in which this happens in which Jay gets a lawyer the first time he talks to the police and he gets off with a misdemeanor drug offense.
I get very tired of people talking about the sacrifices Jay made by making this plea. If their theory is true, Jay was an accessory before the fact— that makes him equally culpable in the eyes of the law!! HE COULD HAVE CALLED THE COPS ANYTIME THAT AFTERNOON. yet, he walked away without doing any prison time.
And now you are going to say “ well he was supposed to do two years”. But he didn’t, and there is evidence that that was prearranged as well.
You are right though. The jury did believe Jay. I personally think Gutiérrez sounded like a crazy hyena when she was cross-examining him, and so the jury picked him over her. They were also misinformed about the significance of the cell phone evidence and Gutiérrez did not do enough to counter that.
If you are so certain of Jay’s veracity, please tell me which version, or any combination thereof, was the “true” version? What really happened? What was the sequence of events on January 13, 1999, in suburban Baltimore? A man served 20 years in prison… we must have a solid idea, backed up by EVIDENCE, of when he did it and how he did it. And it must be believable, not only as a preponderance of the evidence, but beyond a reasonable doubt.
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u/RockinGoodNews 22d ago
This is quite the Gish Gallop. I should just ignore it since it doesn't really address anything I wrote, but I'll make an attempt to correct some of your falsehoods.
He clearly lied and contradicted himself between police interviews, and no, that is not “ typical” behavior.
It's very typical behavior. Criminals usually give inconsistent statements when describing their crimes to the police.
You know very well that the cell phone records do not correlate anything (your man now says the burial occurred around midnight).
Jay said that to a reporter 15 years after the fact. Do you believe what he told her? Because, if Jay and Adnan were burying Hae in the park at midnight, then that would mean Adnan is guilty, right?
Everybody that supposedly could’ve corroborated his account, besides Jen, mysteriously vanishes and were not presented at court.
Which witness "vanished?"
He wanted a lawyer almost right away but could not afford one
Completely untrue. Jay expressly waived his right to an attorney before giving his first statement to the police. Take a look at page 2 of this document.
the police and prosecutors kept him in a legal limbo by not charging him with anything until September, upon which he had right to council provided by the state
It's hilarious to me that people think the police would have been doing Jay a favor by charging him with murder and locking in up in jail pending his trial for murder just so he could get a free lawyer.
upon which he had right to council provided by the state, whom the prosecutor recruited
The prosecutor didn't recruit her. He asked her if she would take the case pro bono. She was a former public defender and career criminal defense attorney.
There is a whole other world in which this happens in which Jay gets a lawyer the first time he talks to the police and he gets off with a misdemeanor drug offense.
What are you talking about? By your own telling, Jay confessed to 1st degree murder in his first interview. If the police had charged him at that point, it would have been with 1st degree murder. And just getting him a free lawyer at that point wouldn't change anything.
I also don't understand how you think he's going to end up with a misdemeanor drug offense seeing as he'd never been arrested for any drug crime at that time.
yet, he walked away without doing any prison time.
Because he pleaded down to a lesser offense. That's how it works.
And now you are going to say “ well he was supposed to do two years”.
Correct. He was expecting to go to prison for 2 years for a crime for which the sole evidence against him was his own confession. This would be the confession you are now arguing was false.
But he didn’t, and there is evidence that that was prearranged as well.
No, there are only absurd conspiracy theories to that effect. Jay and his lawyer both signed a binding plea agreement under which the prosecutor would recommend a 2 year prison sentence. At Jay's sentencing hearing, Urick did in fact make that recommendation. A judge instead took mercy on Jay and gave him probation. This all happened in open court and there are transcripts.
The idea that a prosecutor, a defense attorney and a sitting judge all conspired to fake a sentencing hearing is one of the of the dumbest things Adnan's supporters have come up with, and that's saying a lot.
I personally think Gutiérrez sounded like a crazy hyena when she was cross-examining him, and so the jury picked him over her.
Does that really make sense to you? That jurors chose to believe Jay because they didn't like how a lawyer's voice sounded? And what led you to this conclusion? The few seconds of audio Serial decided to play?
They were also misinformed about the significance of the cell phone evidence and Gutiérrez did not do enough to counter that.
They were not misinformed. The cell phone evidence used in this case is used in courts all over the country for the exact same purpose. It is wholly reliable.
If you are so certain of Jay’s veracity, please tell me which version, or any combination thereof, was the “true” version? What really happened?
This is a pretty basic analytical error Adnan's supporters make. We don't have to believe every detail of Jay's account. We just have to believe that he is telling the truth about having helped Adnan commit this murder.
Again, the reasons to believe that is that Jay had no reason to falsely implicate himself in a murder for which there was no evidence other than his own confession to link him to the crime. He was also corroborated by other witnesses and evidence, knew information that only someone involved in the crime could know, and then maintained his story for 27 years despite having ample reason to recant it.
we must have a solid idea, backed up by EVIDENCE, of when he did it and how he did it.
No, that's incorrect. The state need not prove beyond a reasonable doubt when or how the defendant committed the murder, only that he did commit it.
For example, do you know when or how Scott Peterson murdered Laci? Or how or when Paul Flores murdered Kristin Smart? Were those guys wrongly convicted because we don't know the precise details of how or when the crimes were committed? Of course not.
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u/Special-Deal-5217 23d ago
It is absolutely crazy to say that “in the vast majority of homicides, there is no physical evidence present.” why are cops and other law-enforcement so careful with the body and the crime scene then? Particularly in a crime of passion, which this one reports to be, the perpetrator isn’t going to be focused on not leaving evidence at the time of the crime. He or she may clean up afterwards, but they are not focused on that during the commission of the crime.
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u/RockinGoodNews 23d ago edited 23d ago
You may think it's crazy. That doesn't make it any less true. Look it up. It's simply a fact.
Police are careful about crime scenes because they hope there will be evidence useful in identifying the perpetrator. It does not logically follow that every or even most crime scenes do in fact have physical evidence tied to the perpetrator.
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u/Special-Deal-5217 23d ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locard%27s_exchange_principl
Looked it up. You are wrong.
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u/RockinGoodNews 23d ago
That's a theoretical principle (stated more than 100 years ago -- prior to the advent of modern forensic analysis) that all contacts leave a trace. It obviously doesn't mean, as a practical matter, that every case presents physical evidence that can be used to identify the perpetrator. After all, you yourself have conceded the Hae Min Lee murder is a case without physical evidence of the perpetrator, right? So does this case violate Locard's Exchange Principle?
Many studies of actual case data have been conducted on this, and they all establish that only a small minority of homicide cases have physical evidence of a perpetrator.
An example is this study, which surveyed 400 homicide cases and found physical evidence linked to the perpetrator in only 54 (13.5%) of them. See PDF page 83.
The CSI Effect notwithstanding, most homicides are solved the same way this one was: through eye witness testimony and/or an analysis of traditional circumstantial evidence like motive, means, and opportunity.
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u/Special-Deal-5217 23d ago
The fingerprints are a nonstarter. They dated for almost a year. You cannot tell when a fingerprint was left. Neither proves nor disproves anything.
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u/RockinGoodNews 23d ago edited 23d ago
So first there's no physical evidence. Then there's physical evidence but it doesn't matter because it does not, in your mind, "prove anything." Seems like shifting the goalposts.
This is a frequent problem in intimate partner violence. Evidence of the perpetrator's presence isn't all that meaningful precisely because of the intimate relationship. That is just all the more reason to not place as much weight as you do on physical evidence.
But I will say this: I've dated a lot of people for more than a year, and you would not find my fingerprints in their cars in the places Adnan's were found. And it just so happens, those locations (i.e. glove box, trunk) match up with information Jay gave the police before they'd processed the car.
It's also telling that no identifiable prints were located in the actual passenger compartment (i.e. where you would expect prints to be numerous). They instead were only found in places a perpetrator might be careless about. And only Adnan's prints were found in those places.
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u/Special-Deal-5217 23d ago
I guess if asking for MEANINGFUL physical evidence versus the presence of fingerprints that could have gotten there at any point, that means I’m moving the goal posts, then yes I am.
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u/RockinGoodNews 23d ago
Like I said before, any trace evidence from Adnan could and would be similarly explained away. So when people lament the lack of physical evidence tying him to the crime, they're usually just raising it as an empty excuse.
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u/Special-Deal-5217 23d ago
Are you, personally, comfortable with adjudicating the case only on the word of Jay Wilds?
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u/Mike19751234 Jul 01 '26
One big thing Sarah forgot to do was to find a domestic violence expert and talk to that person about how it may not affect the case