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Serial

This is why you should be following this murder mystery....

There’s still time to catch up with podcast…

IN JANUARY 1999, teenager Hae Min Lee went missing in Baltimore.

A month later, her body was found in a city park. She had been strangled.

Her former boyfriend, Adnan Syed (17), was arrested for the crime. Within a year he was put on trial, found guilty of murder, and thrown in jail.

But did he really do it?

That’s the premise of Serial, a new podcast from the makers of This American Life (which we told you about just before it launched) and people are obsessed with the series.

The obsession is for good reason, as Serial takes a fascinating, in-depth look at a case that might not be as it seems.

Did the pot-smoking Muslim teen with a secret (to his family anyway) ex-girlfriend really kill her in a fit of jealousy? Who was the anonymous caller that tipped off police that Adnan was the person who dumped Hae’s body in a notorious murder spot? Why was Adnan convicted without any physical evidence? Did somebody else kill Hae, and frame Adnan?

The host, longtime radio producer Sarah Koenig (from This American Life), brings the story to life for listeners using piles of legal information and documents, taped police interviews and testimonies, and, most importantly, recordings of her regular telephone calls to Adnan in jail.

We get to hear the convicted murderer himself, telling Koenig he didn’t kill Hae. And we get to hear as his friend, small-time drug dealer Jay, recount to police back in 1999 how Adnan showed him Hae’s body in a Best Buy parking lot.

We, as listeners, get so intimate and familiar with the story that it sometimes takes a while before we realise that this is real life and not an episode of Law and Order. Adnan has been convicted of a crime. We’re playing detective. And no one knows if the podcast will change things.

Innocent or guilty?

In one sense, what Koenig is trying to do is piece together the story, and see if, as his close friends and family maintain, Adnan is really innocent. But it’s not quite as simple as that: this isn’t strictly a ‘let’s prove this guy is innocent’ podcast.

It’s a re-evaluating of a long-finished case, poring over the details, looking at things a different way, and examining elements the legal experts didn’t even see before (wait till you get to episode two to find out one very big thing that wasn’t covered).

It’s a discussion, a conversation, an amateur investigation, on a podcast made by people who themselves don’t even know what the ‘ending’ of the series holds.

It’s one giant, confounding, captivating mystery.

What really happened?

serial timeline Serial Serial

That sense of anticipation, mystery, and feeling that there might not be a clear-cut answer is what drives the obsession with Serial.

Everyone has their own theory about Adnan, or his stoner friend Jay (whose taped police interviews are a key point in Serial), or their friend Jenn.

Eeryone has questions they want answered: Where’s Jay? Was he telling the truth? Was the 3.15 call made by Jay or Adnan? Why would Adnan kill Hae? Did the streaker have anything to do with it? Why would Adnan protest his innocence for all this time?

With six episodes already aired, there’s plenty of time to get stuck into the podcast – trust us, after one episode you’ll be hooked. A new episode is released every Thursday (on iTunes and on the official website), around 12pm Irish time.

You’ll soon be itching to discuss what you’ve heard with other obsessives, so here’s where you can find them:

On the Serial site, you’ll find articles about the ‘smoking gun’ call, and if you hop over to Facebook you can find interviews with Sarah Koenig, where she has given out more tidbits about making the show.

And before you know it, you’ll be like these people (and, ahem, this writer):

Cartwright Comedy / YouTube

What do you think of Serial? Chat amongst yourselves in the comments…

First published 5 November, 8am

Read: Revealing the truth about a teenager’s murder… on a podcast>

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18 Comments
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    Mute Patrick Presley
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    Oct 26th 2023, 8:49 AM

    Enough punishment has been administered for the moment.

    186
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    Mute Donal Ronan
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    Oct 26th 2023, 9:08 AM

    Oops! Less profit for our robber banks, seeing as this is where they make most of their profits, lodging our deposits with the ECB.
    Just another way of socialising their profits at European taxpayers expense.

    97
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    Mute did you every wonder
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    Oct 26th 2023, 1:55 PM

    @Donal Ronan: But we have a regulator, apparently, that keeps prices in check !. Works great for energy and food prices !. Tax payers money at work.

    23
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    Mute larry smith
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    Oct 26th 2023, 9:03 AM

    A bank is being robbed by two gunmen . Everything went smoothly , quickly and quietly ,however before exiting the bank one gunman says to the other what kind of robbery is this if know one is injured or killed “you’re right kill that woman over there “says the other gunman ,
    What’s your name he asks the cashier the woman feebly replied Sophia,
    I can’t kill her as my wife is call Sophia,ok kill the man beside her ,hey fella what’s your name ,,Billy says the man but everyone calls me Sophia .

    108
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    Mute Liam Foy
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    Oct 26th 2023, 11:01 AM

    In what do we believe a bunch of very wealthy individuals in the ECB hiking interest rates, how well expert with experience are they. Lagarde is no expert but she leads the charge. Inflation has got much worse and still the EU has no idea how to contain it like the Japanese at their 3%. But their we go punishing decision for the average family is put off into some future date.

    37
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    Mute Roy Kenneally
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    Oct 26th 2023, 1:39 PM

    @Liam Foy: Inflation isn’t worse. It was 8.6% in Sept 2022 and 5% in Sept 2023, ie. slowing down. It means the price of things are still going up, but not as quickly.

    13
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    Mute Paddy C
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    Oct 26th 2023, 1:48 PM

    Lagarde said when she was here ‘she feels our pain’ doubt that somehow on her salary, pushing people into arrears and possibly homeless great work alright.

    34
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    Mute Timo
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    Oct 26th 2023, 12:08 PM

    And lucky to get 1.5% on a 5 year deposit account.
    What a joke

    28
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    Mute Pato
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    Oct 26th 2023, 9:39 AM

    Have the idiots in the ECB finally recognised what everyone else knew all along, that hiking rates the way they did would eventually cause inflation rather than cure i

    78
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    Mute Monetpenny
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    Oct 26th 2023, 12:33 PM

    @Pato: no. They didn’t get it during & in the aftermath of the 2007-2008 financial crash either. It is written in a widely read economics textbook somewhere that to control inflation (no matter what the cause or type of inflation) you must (‘MUST’ I tell ya) increase interest rates. So they do it.
    If inflation is ‘imported’ or is caused by government lockdowns & subsequent spending to stimulate an economy the government sedated or wars or foreign government policies that affect energy supply & costs it doesn’t matter.
    We don’t stop those wars. We don’t reverse government policy & increase energy supply.
    We increase interest rates.

    22
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    Mute Mick Duvanny
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    Oct 26th 2023, 1:41 PM

    @Monetpenny: See Turkey for what happens when you reduce interest rates during high inflation

    13
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    Mute Eddie Garvey
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    Oct 26th 2023, 3:36 PM

    They printed so much money to keep the economies booming, which had the effect of devaluing our money and our wages, which caused inflation to strike, then they massively increased interest rates to stop people spending the money they added to the system. They are literally making it up as they go along to ensure the wealthy stay wealthy

    20
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    Mute World Taekwondo Association Master Sheamus
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    Oct 26th 2023, 11:02 AM

    About Time, Seriously

    16
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    Mute Des Leavy
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    Oct 26th 2023, 10:51 AM

    Comments Closed

    16
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    Mute Jonathan Hanlon
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    Oct 26th 2023, 1:35 PM

    Please start dropping

    14
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    Mute Alan Fitzgerald
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    Oct 26th 2023, 2:45 PM

    Surely a huge chunk of inflation is down to energy price increases and interest rates increases will have little to no effect on these. Government tax and excise increases also fuels the fire and again interest rates won’t effect these.

    9
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    Mute R Incognito
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    Oct 26th 2023, 2:32 PM

    My fixed rate @ 2.6% is ending in November. Should I re-fix @ 4.15% ( lowest fixed rate available to me ) or stay on a variable @ 4.50% and wait and see if things improve ? I don’t know what to do :-(

    7
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    Mute Paddy C
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    Oct 28th 2023, 9:25 AM

    @R Incognito: very hard one to answer,Im on tracker and my mortgage is up through the roof now for not fixing it and I was also advised to fix it unless I was sure I could keep up with rising payments but if I fix tracker is gone and too long left to go,the only thing I would say is if you could fix it short term at least you wouldnt be after commiting to it too much,a long fixed rate is a nightmare if rates drop, we were on fixed years ago of 5.4 and crash came and rates dropped and losing a fortune had to pay 4,600 to break out of it for the mortgage to drop 400 a month so my advice is if it’s variable try short term fixed especially now that they’re pausing increases

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    Oct 26th 2023, 2:07 PM

    Increasing interest rates to combat this inflation is very close to being useless. Majority of the inflation is a result of the increase in oil prices and from the war in Ukraine affecting supply of various commodities including grain. A serious question for ECB, how does increasing interest rates change oil prices or increase supply of commodities. Wouldn’t it more effective having more constructive negotiation with the Saudis and other oil producers. Also putting a ceiling on the price of basic goods, bread, eggs, pasta, etc. Increasing interest rates was always a possibility of causing recession, plus more unnecessary pain for the less well off.

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    Mute John Moore
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    Oct 26th 2023, 3:43 PM

    Rising interest rates is the only tool that the ECB have to combat inflation. But it can only do so much unless you really want to jack up rates and cause a pretty bad recession. But ECB technocrats act as though tinkering with rates contains all of the answers. It’s mostly for show to look as though they are doing something. About half of the price rises are through companies profiteering. Banks are not passing on nearly enough of the windfall through deposit rates. Whatever way the consumer turns they lose.

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    Oct 26th 2023, 11:00 AM

    I have many money

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    Mute Michael Burke
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    Oct 26th 2023, 1:57 PM

    And few brains cells.

    12
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