Serial Episode 5 Notes and Reflection

Episode 5- Route Talk

Notes

  • First letter Koenig received from Adnan included a challenge:
    • State contented that Hae was killed between 2:15 and 2:36 pm at Best Buy Parking Lot about 1 mile from Woodlawn High School
    • Impossible to make route in 21 mins for multitude of reasons:
      • 1500 other students leaving at same time
      • Can’t get cars out until buses fill up and leave, which takes about 10 minutes
    • Adnan attests that crime couldn’t have happened in 21 minutes, route doesn’t allow it
    • Route to Best Buy has major intersections and a ton of traffic at that time
  • Adnan questions how he could kill Hae, place her body in trunk in broad daylight, and call Jay to meet him there in 21 mins
  • Koenig tries drive twice, and second time her and her producer were like a machine
    • Figure Hae is in a hurry, gets in car fast, 2:17 pm
    • Wait for bus loop to clear-takes a few minutes, near place where Hae gets as snack near the gym- around 11 minutes
    • 17 minutes- just crossing under bellway, and less than a minute later the Best Buy sign is in view
  • Jay stories
    • Saw Adnan at phone booth wearing gloves, meet at farthest corner of parking lot where Hae’s car was parked
  • Juwan
    • Gotten high with Adnan once, was interviewed by the detectives
    • Said he met with Adnan at Best Buy parking lot as that is where Adnan and Hae used to hang out; possibly had physical relationships there
    • Parked where Jay says Hae’s car was parked
  • 18 minutes for Koenig to reach Best Buy, then leaves 3 minutes for crime to be committed in broad daylight
    • Manual strangulation takes a few minutes
    • Phone booth where Adnan was seen by Jay can’t be proven that it was there
      • Phone booth brought up by state, stumped Koenig
  • Call at 2:36 pm on Jay’s cell phone
    • No phone number attached, 5 seconds long, could be Adnan calling
    • 22 minutes, 2 seconds- time taken after phone call made that was timed by Koenig
  • Murder time-range seems far-fetched
    • Murder must take place as quickly as possible and in the most efficient way possible; but it’s not technically impossible
    • Adnan seems astonished and flabbergasted at the time it took Koenig to complete the route
  • Dana and Koenig not done
    • Handwritten itinerary 2 days after Jay’s second interview- lays out Jay’s entire route on Jan. 13th
  • Call record
    • Jay couldn’t know when cell towers pinged when, all meshed together and it was irrefutable
    • Jay’s testimony was corroborated, witnesses support what cell phone records say, and vice versa
  • Recreation of Jay’s route
    • Jay says Adnan is going though Hae’s trunk which contains her body on the I-75 parking ride, which stumps Koenig
    • 11 minutes to get to parking ride, no security cameras here in 1999
    • After leaving parking ride, they were in search of weed, and they called Patrick- time problem; call to Patrick near 4:00 pm
    • Jay and Adnan headed to Forest Park, buy 2 dimes of weed, another call that’s incredibly important
      • Jay’s 2nd interview- Adnan calls girl from Silverspring named Nisha, whom he had been flirting with
        • Only call in time that’s to someone Adnan knew
        • Puts Jay and Adnan together at this time in afternoon, even though Adnan said he was back at school at this time
    • Golf course where Adnan hands phone to Jay
      • Time works and matches Jay’s story
      • Doesn’t match cell tower and the records
      • All calls in the middle in the afternoon don’t ping a call near where Jay says they were driving in the middle of the afternoon
    • Cliffs at Patapsco State Park to smoke a blunt, Koenig believes there must have been other places where they could have smoked
      • 4:30pm hour- sun ready to set
      • Jay says they talked about how it was when Adnan killed Hae, wrapped hand around her throat and she was kicking, worried about Hae scratching him
      • Were at cliffs for 20-30 mins
      • Jay’s testimony doesn’t describe Patapsco’s state park; says conversation between him and Adnan happened in the car
    • 4:45 pm- earliest time they could get back to Woodlawn High School after the state park
  • Jay goes back to Woodlawn around 6pm to pick up Adnan at track practice, says goodbye to Will
    • Will can’t remember that day, was never contacted before Koenig called
    • Will confirms track started at 4pm
    • If late to practice, would have to run extra laps at practice
    • Admits that Jay picked up and dropped off Adnan at practice multiple times before, became common practice
  • Jay says he picked up Adnan at 6pm, outgoing call at 5:38 pm to Adnan’s friend Crista, suggest Adnan had phone at this time, pings tower near Patrick’s house which isn’t near Woodlawn
    • Time line has problems, according to Koenig
  • Cell records
    • Adnan’s case was the first to use cell tower technology as evidence in Maryland
    • Professors at Purdue and Stanford say that the way science was explained is right and way in which state tested cell sites was legit, not junk science
    • Towers, times, and Jay’s stories don’t match in a 6-hour period
  • Evidence points that Jay and Adnan were at Leakin Park around 6-7 pm
    • Twice, phone pinged cell tower near Leakin Park
  • Have witness, but story has shifted and call records as clear as pointed out, don’t always line up with Jay’s story, even though there are times when the records do correlate/line up with Jay’s story
  • Jay told lies, but overall told the truth; main plot points of the murder are consistent

Reflection

More than perhaps any other episode thus far, I found that the most interesting aspect of this particular installment was that at different points of the podcast, either Jay or Adnan’s stories seemed to be supported by the facts given and uncovered by Koenig. At certain intervals, mainly when Koenig and her fellow producers were retracing Jay’s supposed route on January 13th, Adnan seemed to be more and more innocent of Hae’s murder in my eyes as the times that Jay said certain events happened clearly fail to match up with the times that Koenig states are necessary for those events to have occurred. For example, when Adnan supposedly handed Jay his cell phone near a golf course, the pings of the cell towers don’t match Jay’s story; further Koenig states that all of the calls in the middle of the afternoon don’t ping a call near where Jay relays to the detectives where he and Adnan were driving at that time. Koenig explicitly states in this episode that Jay’s timeline clearly has problems and discrepancies, and that her audience should take her word for it; personally, I do take her at her word because throughout this podcast Koenig has proven to be an unbiased investigator who is ultimately trying to discover whether or not Adnan was guilty or innocent of his crime without taking a side. However, at other parts of this episode, it seems as if the facts that Koenig highlights prove that Adnan could have committed this crime, as the evidence collected and the story provided by Jay do match at times, which doesn’t make Adnan look good in the slightest. For example, Koenig and her producer proved that it was technically not impossible for Adnan to have killed Hae within 21 minutes at the Best Buy parking lot on January 13th after school; this piece of evidence, which Adnan was taken aback by, emphasizes that Adnan could have carried out the crime. Furthermore, the evidence that made me most suspicious of Adnan in this episode was the fact that a cell tower near Leakin Park was pinged twice around 7pm the day that Hae was murdered; this more than likely proves that Jay and Adnan were together at Leakin Park on this night, and it is seems that this may have been the time when Adnan buried Hae. Depending on the sources of evidence presented in this episode, compelling cases can be made both for and against Adnan killin Hae on the 13th of January, which makes the story so riveting for the audience.

The precision and attention-to-detail with which Koenig carries out the tracing of Jay’s proposed route on January 13th is what I found to be the most enjoyable and fascinating aspect of this episode. Koenig times every move that Jay says he took herself down to the last second in order to verify whether or not his story is plausible, and this only adds to her credibility in the eyes of the audience. It is quite clear that Koenig along with her producer takes this task very seriously, and it lends credence to her ability to be a thorough investigator who isn’t interested in choosing sides, but rather in uncovering the truth. However, it’s hard for me to see Koenig’s tests and findings as uncovering any conclusive truth, as at certain times her timing of Jay’s route and analysis of his story matches with Jay’s testimony, and yet at other times it’s vastly different and makes the theory that Adnan is innocent more believable. However, I find myself trusting Adnan’s story more than Jay’s primarily because of the fact that in the previous Serial episode Jay outwardly admitted to lying to the detectives about his story and in fact knew nothing about the events of the murder. This coupled with the amount of times that Koenig highlights that there are major time discrepancies within his story leads me to believe that Jay is, at the very least, embellishing the story. I do not completely trust Adnan either, as some evidence that Koenig finds points out that there is a high probability that Adnan was in locations that he said he wasn’t anywhere near on the day of Hae’s murder, and that it is possible that he could have committed the crime within the 21 minute window that the detectives state Hae was murdered in.

While I thoroughly enjoyed the episode, I believe that a summary by Koenig that highlights all of her tests and the conclusions that she made from each would have been helpful, as so many facts were presented within this episode that it was often times difficult to keep up with each one. Particularly when Koenig was describing the significance of the cell towers and each of the calls that Jay and Adnan made to different individuals, I found myself getting lost as to who was calling who as well as befuddled as to the implications of the phone calls within the context of Adnan’s murder trial. Furthermore, including the testimonies and opinions of the detectives involved would have lent even greater insight into the case, specifically as to why they chose to believe Jay despite his untrustworthy testimony as well as flaws within his own timeline. Nonetheless, Koenig exquisitely undertakes the task of retracing every step of Jay’s story in an orderly and meticulous manner, constantly leaving the audience in anticipation as to what compelling evidence will be uncovered next.