I searched for a thread or post about this podcast, but didn't see anything.
Anyone else been following and listening to the episodes? I'm completely hooked. It's so compelling and just absolutely intriguing.
Here's a brief summary from the podcast's site:
On January 13, 1999, a girl named Hae Min Lee, a senior at Woodlawn High School in Baltimore County, Maryland, disappeared. A month later, her body turned up in a city park. She'd been strangled. Her 17-year-old ex-boyfriend, Adnan Syed, was arrested for the crime, and within a year, he was convicted and sentenced to spend the rest of his life in prison. The case against him was largely based on the story of one witness, Adnan’s friend Jay, who testified that he helped Adnan bury Hae's body. But Adnan has always maintained he had nothing to do with Hae’s death. Some people believe he’s telling the truth. Many others don’t.
Sarah Koenig, who hosts Serial, first learned about this case more than a year ago. In the months since, she's been sorting through box after box (after box) of legal documents and investigators' notes, listening to trial testimony and police interrogations, and talking to everyone she can find who remembers what happened between Adnan Syed and Hae Min Lee fifteen years ago. What she realized is that the trial covered up a far more complicated story, which neither the jury nor the public got to hear. The high school scene, the shifting statements to police, the prejudices, the sketchy alibis, the scant forensic evidence - all of it leads back to the most basic questions: How can you know a person’s character? How can you tell what they’re capable of? In Season One of Serial, she looks for answers.
Originally Posted by Buck:
The thing that upset me about this episode was that they continually painted the lawyer in a negative light in previous episodes, and then we find out she tried her hardest to get Adnan's name cleared.
Money situation was shitty though.
Yeah, it kind of hit me hard when they polled the jurors and said they were leaning towards acquittal. The state probably told Jay, listen you better shape up here because from the sounds of it, Jay was night and day with the two trials. [Reply]
The admission of Jay being provided a defense attorney by the prosecution is what caught my ear the most. I've had a hard time buying his story, his shaping of the events of the day of Hae's murder, since the beginning of the podcast, and that revelation just sealed it for me. I don't trust anything he testified to in count.
Hell, I say "his story" like he actually had a single one you can point to. It all changed drastically over time. We have what seems to be a direct witness to the crime who not only appears to have been directed by either (or both) the detectives and/or the prosecution to provide whatever "facts" they think they needed, who later - in addition to a defense attorney who no doubt coached him - was basically given an "attaboy" by the same prosecution at his own sentencing for accessory after the fact (this was back in episode 8 IIRC), who never served a day in prison for his part in the crime. Every bit of this sounds like a frame to me, with Jay given all kinds of benefits in exchange for providing whatever the prosecution wanted.
That, in addition to all the anti-Muslim bias (and remember that this occured before 911) just made me sick. So far we've had jurors who (in past episodes) have admitted to holding his lack of testimony against Adnan despite being told by the judge not to, and now we have jurors talking about how they thought he did it basically because 'those' Muslims (in other countries) don't treat women like real people. Which has been and continues to be true in the larger sense, in certain parts of the world, but how do you say that's the case when you're talking about a 17 year old kid in Maryland? That boggles the mind. [Reply]
Originally Posted by keg in kc:
The admission of Jay being provided a defense attorney by the prosecution is what caught my ear the most. I've had a hard time buying his story, his shaping of the events of the day of Hae's murder, since the beginning of the podcast, and that revelation just sealed it for me. I don't trust anything he testified to in count.
Hell, I say "his story" like he actually had a single one you can point to. It all changed drastically over time. We have what seems to be a direct witness to the crime who not only appears to have been directed by either (or both) the detectives and/or the prosecution to provide whatever "facts" they think they needed, who later - in addition to a defense attorney who no doubt coached him - was basically given an "attaboy" by the same prosecution at his own sentencing for accessory after the fact (this was back in episode 8 IIRC), who never served a day in prison for his part in the crime. Every bit of this sounds like a frame to me, with Jay given all kinds of benefits in exchange for providing whatever the prosecution wanted.
That, in addition to all the anti-Muslim bias (and remember that this occured before 911) just made me sick. So far we've had jurors who (in past episodes) have admitted to holding his lack of testimony against Adnan despite being told by the judge not to, and now we have jurors talking about how they thought he did it basically because 'those' Muslims (in other countries) don't treat women like real people. Which has been and continues to be true in the larger sense, in certain parts of the world, but how do you say that's the case when you're talking about a 17 year old kid in Maryland? That boggles the mind.
I wonder if the general population has less of a bias towards Muslims now than they did pre-911? [Reply]
Originally Posted by keg in kc:
The admission of Jay being provided a defense attorney by the prosecution is what caught my ear the most. I've had a hard time buying his story, his shaping of the events of the day of Hae's murder, since the beginning of the podcast, and that revelation just sealed it for me. I don't trust anything he testified to in count.
Hell, I say "his story" like he actually had a single one you can point to. It all changed drastically over time. We have what seems to be a direct witness to the crime who not only appears to have been directed by either (or both) the detectives and/or the prosecution to provide whatever "facts" they think they needed, who later - in addition to a defense attorney who no doubt coached him - was basically given an "attaboy" by the same prosecution at his own sentencing for accessory after the fact (this was back in episode 8 IIRC), who never served a day in prison for his part in the crime. Every bit of this sounds like a frame to me, with Jay given all kinds of benefits in exchange for providing whatever the prosecution wanted.
That, in addition to all the anti-Muslim bias (and remember that this occured before 911) just made me sick. So far we've had jurors who (in past episodes) have admitted to holding his lack of testimony against Adnan despite being told by the judge not to, and now we have jurors talking about how they thought he did it basically because 'those' Muslims (in other countries) don't treat women like real people. Which has been and continues to be true in the larger sense, in certain parts of the world, but how do you say that's the case when you're talking about a 17 year old kid in Maryland? That boggles the mind.
Yeah I knew of the attorney stuff about Jay because of the Reddit board. Also, the judge of the case has gone her FB and say that doesn't give a shit what Serial says, Adnan is guilt and is manipulative. I couldn't believe she struck down the Jay is benefiting from the free lawyer.
I just think the whole thing is sad. Sad that Hae was murdered, sad that Adnan really might have been apart of it, sad that Jay lied and is probably apart of it and the saddest of all - that there is so many holes in this case and Adnan was convicted. As a juror, presented with the information they had only, not the stuff on serial, I would have said to myself "They probably did it, but it's not concrete - not guilty by reasonable doubt. [Reply]
Yeah, I don't know whether or not Adnan was a part of it or not. I just can't believe he was convicted based on the available evidence. It's basically just an unbelievably untrustworthy witness and a girl he was probably banging at the time saying "he did it" and making sure their timeline matched what was on the cell tower call sheet. Which itself isn't reliable, as we know now (referring to the locations). [Reply]
Originally Posted by keg in kc:
Yeah, I don't know whether or not Adnan was a part of it or not. I just can't believe he was convicted based on the available evidence. It's basically just an unbelievably untrustworthy witness and a girl he was probably banging at the time saying "he did it" and making sure their timeline matched what was on the cell tower call sheet. Which itself isn't reliable, as we know now (referring to the locations).
Yeah - I just don't get how any juror could see Jay's stories shifting and say "he's credible" [Reply]
Originally Posted by Pushead2:
Yeah - I just don't get how any juror could see Jay's stories shifting and say "he's credible"
I think the answer is that they didn't. See his story shifting that is. At least I'm assuming they didn't have access to transcripts of his interviews and/or testimony from the first trial (like we do). He probably came across like a kid from the block, maybe even a kid from the block being attacked by the defense attorney when she did point out his inconsistencies. We have a veritable map of lies laid out in front of us now. They just had whatever they were fed by the prosecution. By a kid sitting on the stand sounding polite and respectable and smart. It was well-performed theater.
Maybe the ethnic thing was a part of it too, a black kid being more relatable to the jurors (whether they were black themselves or not) than a muslim kid, not to mention that the muslim kid didn't even speak up for himself.
If they really did have multiple people on the jury (or influential members of the jury) with the kind of views the juror on the podcast expressed about muslim culture, then Adnan may have been screwed from the get-go with that particular group. [Reply]
There is so much reasonable doubt, I can't see how they could come back with a guilty verdict. And after this week's episode, it's looking like him being a Muslim hurt him considerably. [Reply]
Originally Posted by keg in kc:
I think the answer is that they didn't. See his story shifting that is. At least I'm assuming they didn't have access to transcripts of his interviews and/or testimony from the first trial (like we do). He probably came across like a kid from the block, maybe even a kid from the block being attacked by the defense attorney when she did point out his inconsistencies. We have a veritable map of lies laid out in front of us now. They just had whatever they were fed by the prosecution. By a kid sitting on the stand sounding polite and respectable and smart. It was well-performed theater.
Maybe the ethnic thing was a part of it too, a black kid being more relatable to the jurors (whether they were black themselves or not) than a muslim kid, not to mention that the muslim kid didn't even speak up for himself.
If they really did have multiple people on the jury (or influential members of the jury) with the kind of views the juror on the podcast expressed about muslim culture, then Adnan may have been screwed from the get-go with that particular group.
Very true about the first trial part, but Adnan lawyer made it clear via the trial audio that she got Jay to say that he told the police a bunch of lies during his 4 interviews. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Taco John:
There is so much reasonable doubt, I can't see how they could come back with a guilty verdict. And after this week's episode, it's looking like him being a Muslim hurt him considerably.
Yeah - the way the bail lawyer turned that community of people rallying to Adnan's side, into possible threat for him to escape, it was painted like they were terrorists "pre 9/11". [Reply]
One thing that gets me too is zoned in the cops were into going after Adnan. They interviewed the most retarded people possible and ignored so many others.
My cousin is a retired detective and she said that they even if they had this situation on hand with Jay & Adnan, they would cover all ends to protect their own asses. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Pushead2:
One thing that gets me too is zoned in the cops were into going after Adnan. They interviewed the most retarded people possible and ignored so many others.
My cousin is a retired detective and she said that they even if they had this situation on hand with Jay & Adnan, they would cover all ends to protect their own asses.
Baltimore PD had had a very bad string of unsolved cases and cases where the screwed things up so bad they couldn't prosecute. They needed a "win" badly, so it seems they made sure they had a quick solve. [Reply]
Originally Posted by mikeyis4dcats.:
Baltimore PD had had a very bad string of unsolved cases and cases where the screwed things up so bad they couldn't prosecute. They needed a "win" badly, so it seems they made sure they had a quick solve.
Originally Posted by mikeyis4dcats.:
Baltimore PD had had a very bad string of unsolved cases and cases where the screwed things up so bad they couldn't prosecute. They needed a "win" badly, so it seems they made sure they had a quick solve.