Summary Of Sarah Koenig's Serial

Sarah Koenig's Serial based upon the murder of Hae Min Lee and the investigation and legal proceedings that followed the murder. The primary suspect during the investigation, Adnan Syed, was eventually found guilty after a mistrial and has since spent his time in prison with an impeccable record. Both Adnan and Hae were outstanding students involved with various extracurricular activities and were generally considered friends, even after they broke up. Hae ended the year long relationship under what seemed to others as amicable terms. The primary motive the investigators presented was that the murder was simply a crime of passion. Adnan's case brings to light many of the flaws present in our current legal system such as how a decision may not

It is now popular belief that Adnan's conviction is the result of his lawyer's failure to represent him efficiently and her failure to use all the evidence provided to establish a strong case that would establish reasonable doubt. The most consistent example that draws the most attention is her decision to not test the DNA evidence collected at Hae's burial site. The investigators chose not to test the DNA simply because it may have proved Adnan's innocence. Gutierrez was fully aware of this fact, yet she still chose to not test the evidence even though it could clear Adnan's name. The supporters of Gutierrez's choice state that her decision was rational since the DNA evidence could have also made it appear even more likely that that he committed the crime. The Undisclosed Podcast then discovered that Gutierriez may have actually requested testing of the DNA, but the request was mad too late. This could be seen as another example of Gutierrez's neglect for the case. Gutierrez continued to neglect the case; whether it was the alibi that Asia provided that could have finally cemented where Adnan was on the day Hae went missing, to her choice of not disputing the cell tower records because they records were stated by an expert to not be valid in a court of law. The question that must now be asked is: How many other cases have had these same flaws and therefore how many innocent people are in prison?

For example, without the media attention, the investigators may have gone into more depth and spent more time on the investigation. The investigators did not spend much time investigating suspects other than Adnan because of one lead. The detectives closed the case quickly simply to appease the public. The media also played on the fact that it is common for such a crime to be a crime of passion, and in the public's eye, it was plausible. Since the case, the two investigators have been removed from their positions because they were found to have falsified evidence in several investigations; however Adnan's case was not investigated to see if they had falsified any evidence in his