Adnan Syed. is he innocent?

Mixed emotions are just one way to describe the way I felt about the “Serial” podcast. At times I thought that he must be innocent. Then my opinion would completely change and I thought he had to be guilty. It’s so hard to make an educated decision on whether or not a man should be locked away or set free because either way, it has its consequences. After sifting through all the evidence I was provided with throughout the podcast, I have ultimately come to my decision...

Taking a quote from the podcast, it seems to me that indeed Adnan is guilty. Adnan’s friend Jay tells the police and jury that Adnan informed him that he did kill Hae. He also told them that he helped Adnan disregard the body. What should be enough evidence to put Adnan in jail, as the podcast goes on, Jay’s testimony made many changes. In his interview with The Intercept Jay clarifies the reason why his story was constantly changing. “I stonewalled them that way. No — until they told me they weren’t trying to prosecute me for selling weed, or trying to get any of my friends in trouble. People had lives and were trying to get into college and stuff like that. Getting them in trouble for anything that they knew or that I had told them — I couldn’t have that.” I believe that Jay’s testimony was nearly made up in order to protect himself and loved ones from the legal prosecution he was going to face. Jay also changed his story from going to Leakin Park at 7pm, to being there after midnight. Majority of the testimony was based off of cell phone records. Moreover, he mentions that he got a call after midnight, when the cell phone records show otherwise; another instance which kills all credibility he had (Klein).  This piece of evidence pushed me towards Syed’s innocence. Jay was selling drugs and could have gotten into a lot of trouble legally.

A girl by the name of Asia McClain was another important person in the involvement of the Serial’s podcast. She was in touch with Adnan and said she was going to testify on his behalf. Her reasoning was because she claims she was with him in the library during the time of the murder. Obviously, this helped persuade me towards believing in Adnan’s innocence. Oddly enough, she never did testify for Adnan; but now as the case is resurfacing, two people released emails that spoke against Asia’ testimony. The two people in charge of composing the emails stated that they were in class with Asia when she said: “that she believed so much in Adnan’s innocence that she would make up a lie to prove he couldn’t have done it”. Adnan himself was shocked when presented Asia’s letters (Delaney). Now, the strongest piece of evidence in Syed’s favour had been contradicted by the two emails written by the students.  

Both images taken from: “Maps, Documents, Etc.” Serial, serialpodcast.org/season-one/maps.

The third extremely important and intriguing piece of evidence I found was regarding the cell phone records. The court used Jay’s faulty testimonies and Adnan’s cell phone records as their evidence in solving the case. The largest piece of evidence against Adnan was the cell phone records. But, when taking another look at the records, the Judge decided to reopen his trial due to the “failure to cross-examine the state’s cell tower expert about the reliability of cell tower location evidence” (Klein) during his first trial. Other then that, Adnan drove Hae’s car when he was on his way to the crime scene (where he buried her). After inspecting the car, there was not even a single trace of any mud, grass or anything else in the car. The evidence I read in this article is what ultimately shaped me into believing Adnan’s innocence.

Overall, I think that because of Jay’s changing testimonies and inconsistent cell phone records and just an overall lack of real solid evidence; I believe it is wrong to have Adnan is jail for a crime he clearly cannot be rightly prosecuted for. Therefore proving my ideas as to why I believe Adnan to be innocent.