Serial Podcast Case

How do you think it would feel to know that your free life is basically over before you even got it? Adnan Syed was charged with capital murder in June of 1999 and was sentenced to life in prison. Although he was accused of killing his ex girlfriend Hae Lee, Adnan Syed is innocent. So who really is the killer?

The Serial podcast is a suspenseful exploration into dramatic scenarios in which host Sarah Koenig shares the story of a murder in Baltimore, Maryland. This is a murder case podcast is about a young boy named Adnan, who supposedly killed his ex girlfriend named Hae. Sarah Koenig decided to take on the case years after the conviction. Adnan Syed's conviction was overturned in 2016 after the podcast led to doubts about his guilt. (Koenig)

As Adnan was growing up he wasn’t supposed to have girlfriends or even really talk to girls. He had a secret relationship with Hae Lee. The state used that against him in the case saying that it made him a good liar. They had a on and off type of relationship. They broke up and she was now dating a man named Don. The day Hae Lee when missing everyone was worried, but they all thought she had just ran away with her new boyfriend. Adnan had asked her for a ride that day because he let Jay, a close friend borrow his car. Adnan was seventeen years old at the time the murder happened. According to juvenile justice scholar Barry Feld this age, “impairs a youth’s competence to make good legal decisions and participate effectively in legal proceedings.” (Murray) Adnan needed to be represented by an adult that could guide him through these proceedings and help him have an adequate defense. The evidence that the state had on Adnan failed to provide an alibi, the cell phone evidence, Jay Wilds' testimony, and that Adnan had motive to kill her. Why was there so much evidence that wasn’t tested? They didn’t test DNA that would have been on Hae’s body. If you were being strangled, would you just let it happen or would you fight back? I know I would be scratching and hitting, therefore there would be skin particles under my nails and on my

Chaudry knew Adnan as one of her brother’s friends. She believed that he was innocent from the beginning.She stated in a interview with People magazine, “...he was the least confrontational, nicest person-the only friend of my brother’s my mother liked.” (Truesdell) She believed that his case was mishandled. Hae’s boyfriend at the time, Don Clinedinst was cleared early in the case, however police never actually checked his albi. He had told police that he was working at Hunt Valley LensCrafters store that day. This was a store that he did not normally work at. Susan Simpson a colleague of Chaudry’s did her own investigating and discovered that the manager of that store was Don’s mother. The schedule did not indicate that there was a change in the lab tech schedule for that day. It seems as if time cards were changed to make it look like Don was at work when he actually may have not been. This evidence was never brought up. The police didn’t verify his information with the Hunt Valley Store. The mother being the manager could have easily changed the time cards to show he was working that day well before anyone knew that she was dead.