Found out about this here this morning and have since listened to every episode. I find myself wishing that I hadn’t, though, because I hate waiting for the next one.
Are there other comparable true crime/mystery-style podcasts out there?
Same. I heard the last half of the first episode when they played it on NPR a few weeks ago, but then completely forgot to follow up with the podcast. I went through the whole thing in a few hours yesterday, and think it’s great so far.
So far we don’t have any reason to believe any new evidence has been uncovered, do we? All of the details still haven’t been revealed and with all of the inconsistencies in Jay’s story (as well as what has been revealed about his character and that he helped destroy evidence) I feel like there still must be some bombshell being left out for Adnan to take the fall for this.
So even though this week was supposed to be about problems with Jay’s timeline, I still thought Adnan came away looking guiltier to me than before the episode. And next week is supposed to be about problems with Adnan’s timeline, so I bet that will feeling will only grow next week.
Kudos to the podcast by the way for making all the times and events clear, and making me focus on each detail in rapt attention. This one was not one I could have listened to while multitasking, unlike a lot of other podcasts. So I’m glad I was doing nothing else when I heard it.
So, from what I gather after listening to an interview with Sarah Koenig and Ira Glass on my local NPR station, they were hoping that over the course of this season’s run, other people would get wind of the podcast, and come forward with additional evidence. And as a teaser, Sarah said that is indeed what has happened.
After listening to the latest (Oct 30th), I’m gonna have to say, it’s looking pretty bleak for Adnan, but then there is that bit at the end, and boy, either he’s innocent , or he’s one hell of a liar/manipulator. Even with all the evidence piling up against him, he’s one convincing dude.
I’m not sure about how the law works in a case like this, but it seems like he had his shot at a retrial, and the judge shot it down. I have no idea if you get, like, unlimited opportunities based on new evidence, or what, but it seems like the project is less about getting Adnan out of jail, and more about getting to the bottom of a very complicated story.
It’s blowing my mind, how good this podcast is. Thursday is my new favorite day of the week.
I agree it’s not looking good for Adnan. There really aren’t any other suspects that had a motive at this point. The only other person it could be would be Jay but why would he do it?
I’m all over the place on this. But right now I’m leaning towards Adnan as the guilty party. Although I’m still surprised that Jay never faced any kind of accomplice charge.
At the risk of sounds incredibly stupid, why wasn’t Jay the prime suspect? His story changed – and changed – and changed – and it’s not like Adnan had a real motive, either. Jay didn’t have an alibi (or did Jenn alibi him and I’m somehow forgetting that)?
It might be that Serial is setting up the story the way that a few Frontline episodes have, where they show you a ton of evidence that point you in a direction, then swing your viewpoint back the other way with a reveal that totally changes your view on things. There was a Frontline episode about a potential arson case a while ago that implicated the father as being the killer, as he had some weird erratic behavior both before and after the incident, and he went to jail for it. Years later, a real forensic fire expert looked at the evidence and claimed that the guy was innocent beyond all doubt. In case you haven’t seen that story yet, I’m not going to spoil the ending…http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/death-by-fire/
So far I’ve been enjoying the podcast a ton, being a regular TAL listener for many years. I hope Sarah does better than that guy from planet money who couldn’t pitch his own startup company idea. So far, it seems like she’s got a solid story, and inherited (with TAL’s help I’m sure) a great way to tell a story. I’ve been resisting all possible “spoilers” in the case, like googling it to see what the current state of affairs is, and if anything has changed from broadcast until now.
I’ve been wondering if Jay worked out some deal that he’s immune to prosecution if he testifies, 'cause his actions seem awfully sketchy.
Don’t be. I’m so happy you created this one. I’m completely hooked on this podcast and I can’t thank you enough for putting it on my radar.
Thanks Scott.
-xtien
Heck yeah, thanks for starting the thread. I can’t wait for every Thursday.
I’m pretty convinced Adnan is guilty thus far. He comes across as a guy trying to live in the skin of being innocent for a looong time. His answers seem too pat. …then again, maybe that’s cause he is innocent!
It’s got to be him or Jay. The evidence seems pretty strong against Adnan. They’re sitting on the Jay episode clearly. There could be some bombshell, but given as they claim to be barely apace of the release schedule, I’m not counting on it. I won’t hold it against them if we never get the decisive closure we’re hoping for. The journey has been fascinating all on its own.
You think the evidence seems strong? I’m wondering how they managed to convict him at all. The criteria, as far as I know, is supposed to be “beyond a reasonable doubt”. I’m seeing plenty of reasonable doubt. There’s got to be more to it than Jay’s testimony, but that seems like the only positive evidence of Adnan’s guilt. Everything else is just circumstantial stuff that doesn’t look good but doesn’t really do much to incriminate him either. At best most of it confirms that Adnan and Jay were hanging out, and since Adnan doesn’t dispute that, just the part where he strangled Hae and was burying her body with Jay…
Even the “smoking gun” of the Niesha call is suggestive, but with her number on speed dial and the short duration of the call I feel like there are explanations other than that Adnan was the one to place the call. And if he were, in the scenario where he’s murdered Hae, he wouldn’t have disposed of her corpse yet. Why would he call this other girl in the middle of it, and why only for a couple of minutes? To me it’s more plausible that Jay or even someone riding with Jay who was not Adnan (who, after all, is claiming to have been in school at the time) accidentally or purposefully dialed this number on Adnan’s contact list. I don’t think Niesha would recognize a voice she heard for two minutes or so weeks beforehand, and on the phone at that. Wrong numbers happen. And while Jay would have no reason to know Niesha, that means he wouldn’t know her number or have a reason to make extended conversation. If she’s on the top of the speed dial list and the conversation were two minutes long, well, that’s more plausible.
And while Jay’s story is certainly possible, in broad strokes at least if not the particular timeline he establishes, I find it more than a little implausible. Let’s throw out the question of why Adnan would have decided to kill Hae in a premeditated and calculated way. He doesn’t present as that sort of person and there doesn’t seem to be any real motive other than breakups that he doesn’t seem to have taken all that hard, but that doesn’t mean he couldn’t have had one. The idea that he would enlist the aid of this other guy he barely knew in the process of dealing with the aftermath, and not just that, but dink around getting high and going to friends’ houses and such in the meantime? That makes no sense to me. Again, not necessarily impossible - people do weird things, even when murder is involved - but implausible as hell.
That said, it’s also hard to see why Jay would make all this shit up or know where her car was if it weren’t true on some level, (unless he killed her or was trying to protect someone who did, but it’s hard to see why he would kill her and who would he need to protect that badly?).
…to a jury of his peers. That’s what you’re missing. People are convicted of crimes on a daily basis based on less evidence than that presented in Adnan’s trial. There’s really no such thing as “beyond a reasonable doubt”…especially in this day and age.
It also sounds like his defense attorney didn’t do a very good job. The evidence with the cell phone records doesn’t sound especially strong (10 of the 14 calls don’t support the case, so the prosecution cherry-picked the ones that did), but the defense attorney didn’t use that to their advantage. Did Adnan hire an attorney? Was this a public defendant?
As someone who’s been involved in a civil suit that went to court, I know first hand that what comes out in testimony is really only part of the story - it’s what you can prove happened without opening yourself up to cross examination, and a lot of the “evidence” is about building a perception of the person on trial.
Didn’t the series start out with the claim that Adnan’s primary attorney was later disbarred for various violations?
I agree that the evidence is shaky, but there is enough logical evidence to place the murder, or at least involvement with it, on one of two people - Adnan or Jay. We haven’t had the full case against Jay laid out yet, but there are big red flags against Adnan. The Niesha call. The fact that he never bothered to try and reach Hae after she disappeared. There are inconsistencies in Adnan’s recalling of his relationship with Jay. I’m going to have to hear more about possible motives or capabilities for Jay to mastermind a plot against Adnan, but logic right now is pointing me toward Adnan as the guilty party.
I don’t buy the argument that Adnan didn’t seem too distraught about the breakup so he couldn’t have done it. Adnan is a smart and charismatic guy, and he seems capable of either hiding his true feelings or actively crafting the perception of lacking concern about the breakup.
I’d never argue that, based on the evidence we’ve been exposed to so far, Adnan could not have done it. You don’t need to prove someone had motive, and frankly, for most of us, the mindset that would lead someone to premeditated murder is sufficiently alien that we would not necessarily recognize that motive if it existed. But I do think that the case presented so far is weak and not particularly conclusive.
We know from the works of David Simon that clearance rate was and perhaps still is a big focus of Baltimore’s homicide division, so it makes sense to me that the cops and indeed the state would want to go with the viable, if tenuous answer to the case rather than trying to explain the even larger range of unanswered questions that would attend dismissing Adnan as the killer. And perhaps that was the right call. But I don’t think they’d be presenting this case to us if that conclusion were definitive.
I don’t agree with that, though. They’ve presented quite a bit of evidence that supports the conviction so far. Of course, they’ve also presented a few things that have thrown doubt on that evidence too. But to say “Adnan could not have done it” is something I don’t think anyone can say.
New episode is up! Downloading now.
I loved this episode so much. Diedre is now one of my favorite people in the world. Seriously, God bless her for the work she does. She’s amazing.