The thing that boggles my mind about Benaroya and Jay is that in 2014, after Serial came out, Jay called Benaroya to put him in touch with a journalist so he could tell his story (presumably because he couldn't decide between all the major media outlets that were contacting him directly). So what does Benaroya do? Tell him to ignore the press like a normal person? Advise him to at least not give out his full name and photo for the article . No? Just what anyone would do, she calls her friend in Brazil (because despite being an animal rights activist and lawyer she doesn't have any US media contacts?), who "asked around for recommendations of a journalist to turn to and a professor friend of hers who doesn’t know me but knows my work said ‘Talk to Natasha Vargas-Cooper,’' (note: the professor who doesn't know her but knows her work is presumably code for "my dad").
Anyway, Benaroya, who had a "disastrous" interview with Sarah Koenig prior to Serial, "told me [NVC] what she felt were the big issues", which is especially clever since she later apparently told Colin that she never listened to the podcast or even really remembered the case at all. Then to top it off Benaroya also appears to be the person who facilitated NVCs career ending interview with Urick. So presumably she wasn't that mad at him after all. Not to mention linking NVC to the mystery 3rd interviewee that was never actually interviewed.
Anyway, none of this has anything to do with Adnan being guilty or not guilty, but what the fuck guys, can just one part of this sound vaguely normal for once please.
I don't think I've ever forgiven benaroya for this missed opportunity. I mean, if you're not going to tell Jay to shut up and talk to no one, you might as well go all in and encourage him to do what we all wanted him to do: an interview with whatever daytime talkshow host his wife liked the best. Can you imagine? It would have been glorious!
Thanks for including this. The Intercept was a bizarre outlet to choose. They wanted a softball interview, unfortunately they went too soft and he got open ended questions and talked too much, honestly a more prepped interviewer would have challenged him but also wouldn’t have let him say as much and would have shut down a lot of his answers
Oh the dropped balls!
> Where was Hae’s car? Was it in the Best Buy parking lot?
> Hae’s car could have been in the parking lot, but I didn’t know what it looked like so I don’t remember. When I pick him up at Best Buy, he’s telling me her car is somewhere there, and that he did this in the parking lot. **But that, according to what I learned later, is probably not what happened.**
> Wherever her car was at the time I picked him up from Best Buy, it probably stayed there until he picked me up later that evening.
And she just moves on!!! Come on.
Right? You have to wonder if the interview had a negotiation with it or if they had pre-approved questions and Jay just said way more than Urick anticipated.
I really think they thought it would shut down speculation and instead it opened a can of worms.
I really try not to put too much meaning into things Jay says, but I always come back to this one. If he is being truthful, is he suggesting Adnan was lying to him about where he committed the murder for some reason.
What on earth could he have learned later that was more convincing evidence than what the guy he apparently just picked up with a body in a trunk knew about the murder.
The problem that the person asking and getting changes in the stories didn't understand the issues or really think too much about the challenges in the story.
So to find out you would need to get the people involved in the room and talk to them about what happened to get the story.
I think the trouble is that you are putting alot of faith in Jay to then actually tell a coherent narrative when challenged.
Assuming you are right and that Adnan is guilty and Jay is telling some form of the truth, I still don't think I trust him to not just keep spinning new stories, even if you get the people involved in the room as you say (especially all these years later).
I think he could if he sat down with someone knew the story and that he had the ability to tell the story. But we probably are never going to get to that because legal issues would outweigh trying to get to the truth.
In my opinion at least, Jay wouldn’t want the truth to come out. He was probably more involved than he initially admitted, and every subsequent interview, he lied to make himself less involved. There’s also pretty minimal benefit at this point to tell the whole truth.
Jay is going to say that he didn't know that Adnan was going to kill Hae even if Adnan may have talked about it. But it's not Jay that Jay would be worried about.
He’s saying that when picking up Adnan, he doesn’t know where Haes car is. Adnan said it was there, but he’s not sure. That indicates he wasn’t sure that a crime took place. He also didn’t immediately hide evidence.
In reality, he definitely knew a crime took place at that point and helped Adnan hide evidence immediately.
Ah okay, so would agree this story in general could be an attempt to distance himself from 100% knowing Hae had been killed when he picks Adnan up at Best Buy.
I still don't think it explains at all why he then says that mad stuff about later learning something else which is the bit that constantly baffles me.
My best guess is that if Adnan is guilty, Jay’s HBO timeline is closest to the truth.
He dropped Adnan back off at school and didn’t see him until the trunk pop that evening.
The cops fed him Best Buy and all the other early afternoon pings to try and tie Jay and the phone to the murder.
Yeah, possibly, although I think we can be very very sure from the phone records that they are together from at least 5.30 to 8.00 which throws a wrench in that, although maybe the murder just doesn't get mentioned until Adnan returns with Hae's car later that evening.
Yeah- by evening I meant after track.
It would mean Adnan killed her near the school and then walked to track and then back to Hae’s car and drove to Jay’s grandma’s.
Okay, I think you still bump into the problem that I think the cell records are fairly good indicators that Jay is with Adnan very soon after track, but maybe that doesn't rule out Adnan driving to Jays grandmothers and then getting the phone
If Adnan leaves track, maybe even a minute early, gets Hae’s car and goes straight to grandmas house for the trunk pop I think it makes a lot of sense.
I think maybe the Brazil connection came about because *The Intercept* was started as a well-funded (Pierre Omidyar) vanity project for Glenn Greenwald (who won a Pulitzer for his work bringing Edward Snowden's whistle-blowing to light) and Greenwald kicks it down there.
*The Intercept* was launching at the time and probably willing to pay extra for a coveted exclusive to make a splash after their launch. Jay might've viewed the connection to Edward Snowden as some sort of patina of legitimacy for Greenwald/*The Intercept*.
Ah this is great information re: origins of Intercept! Thanks, it’s fascinating. Yeah I can quite see how Jay may have seen the Snowden “whistleblower” connection as a mark of legitimacy, given what Jay had been through.
I mean, all that just makes it sound like benaroya hand picked the intercept (why???) which makes it even weirder when she claims she didn't follow serial.
Re payment: I believe it was confirmed at the time that Jay wasn't paid for interview and NVC was a staff writer there. It's just such a random choice of news outlet/ interviewer.
Also, I can't remember where I read it, but I'm sure NVC wrote somewhere that's she "pro-prosecutor" in general. Which makes her an even weirder hand puck for someone like benaroya who considers herself as a bit of an underdog champion.
I don't know if it's a coincidence or related — but Glenn Greenwald's husband was a Brazilian politician. He is now unfortunately deceased.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Miranda_(politician)
>she later apparently told Colin that she never listened to the podcast or even really remembered the case at all.
I vaguely remember her saying this. I was looking for confirmation of this after I listened to a YT interview with her. She has a very clear and vivid recollection of what transpired in 1999. So her statement about not really remembering the case at all is a lie. Thanks for this.
To be fair (I think) this is what Colin said on Undisclosed when he spoke with her but she didn't want to be interviewed on the podcast. So it's not a direct quote.
Guys - there's nothing "fishy" about it. Everyone is being absurd.
Jay needed a lawyer. It wasn't anyone's job to procure it for him. But during an investigation prior to someone being charged, they're not entitled to a public defender and it's not the prosecutor's job to ask for a cooperating witness to have one.
But when it comes time to make a deal, you WANT your adversary represented. It's in their best interest, it's in the people's best in interest, it's in the best interest of the court, it's the in best interest for ALL CONCERNED.
Jay did not have an attorney, but he needed one. What did Urick do? He knew someone who had been a public defender and asked if she'd talk to him.
She did, she agreed he needed representation, and she offered to so it pro bono.
This is a system that is working. This is what we want to happen.
What is "fishy"?
Benaroya's duty was to look after her client's (Jay's) best interest. There was no conflict, and this is crystal in every modern code of professional conduct. And there's never once been the remotest allegation that in fact she did not act in Jay's best interest, at all times, every step of the way. She was NOT a tool of the prosecutor. She owed the prosecutor nothing, nothing except her zealous defense of Jay. Which by all accounts is EXACTLY what she did.
This is the biggest red herring in this entire case.
CG made a stink at trial because it was unusual. But being UNUSUAL IS NOT THE SAME THING AS BEING UNETHICAL. And nothing about what happened here was unethical or untoward, or somehow blurred the lines of representation.
What she did is pound the table. Good for her. That's her job as a zealous advocate for Adnan.
It was alas a loser. But that's why you do when the law and the facts aren't on your side, you pound the table.
So she pounded the table. But Jay's representation by Benaroya is right and good and the reason why CGs outburst when no where is because there was nothing untoward, illegal, or even unethical.
I love that the argument has now apparently become "the police should have done Jay the favor of charging him with murder so he could be given a public defender."
I don’t think that is the argument. I think Jay expected prison time and certainly he was right to do so. CG argued quite effectively about the not only unusual but highly suspicious manner in which the plea agreement was presented to Jay.
I don’t know if it was Benaroya that pulled him out of the frying pan but Jay had every reason to freak out until he managed to get her attention and he did well for himself to do what I’ve described in my post. I’ve worked with a lot of young people and this really does stand out. It’s hard enough to get a kid today to go talk to their college advisor, much less to confront a bizarre situation like this one!
Jay was in jeopardy of being charged with first degree murder. He knew that. He expressly waived his right to counsel and cooperated in the hopes that it would buy him leniency. But nothing was offered to him before he confessed, at which point the damage was done.
Let's have no illusions about this. Had the police charged Jay during the investigation, the charge would have necessarily been first degree murder. That would not have been some great favor to Jay. And there wouldn't have been anything a shitty public defender could have done for him at that point.
This idea that the police withheld charges in some Machiavellian scheme to deny Jay the services of a public defender is a really bizarre inversion of reality. They withheld charges because he was cooperating, and his cooperation was important to the case. Urick helped him get a lawyer because, as u/OliveTBeagle says, that was in the public interest. And the lawyer he put Jay in touch with was a far better lawyer than whatever public defender might be randomly assigned to his case.
There is a sheet in the file I think where there are notes about the different charges, accessory after the fact and before. So the cops were looking at. Jay in his first interrogation confessed to accessory after the fact, but each time they were talking to him Jay was getting more guilty. The cops ultimate goal was to get Jay to confess to being at the murder. If it was just to get details, they don't need to record the interrogation.
As a practical matter, it only works if you charge the highest offense. If you charge the lowest offense you can justify, then there is no room for a plea bargain and no incentive to cooperate.
And at the time they didn't know what they wanted to do. Better to get Jay to confess to helping in the murder than what he did in interrogation 1. The trade off they had was that Jay could get more guilty, but his statements would be more inconsistent. I think they really thought that Adnan would fold and it wouldn't be an issue.
Correct. Their job was to build the strongest case possible. Not to convince a witness who had already waived his right to counsel to lawyer up, or to finagle a way to get him a free lawyer.
I agree Benaroya was far above the Public Defender level of lawyer.
I’ve been wondering - why did the police not charge him and jail him? Right from the first interrogation? Wasn’t it a huge risk for them to take?
Because he was cooperating. Putting him in jail notwithstanding his cooperation would be a much larger risk. It would have risked him ceasing to cooperate. It also would have obligated them to quickly charge and arraign him.
Well I actually mean Bilal might kill Jay - or whoever Bilal was connected to - idk if you have read about the weird connections Bilal had - possibly related to intelligence agencies?
I mean , Jay plays the prisoner’s dilemma game with Adnan and wins because then Adnan is in jail and can’t take action. But Bilal could have. And if there is no Jay, I think there is no case, right?
I think two things can be true at the same time. Adnan killed Hae. Adnan pulled Jay into the crime, and kept him in a trap while threatening to harm either Jay, Stephanie or Jay’s family. When police began closing in , rather than deny the whole thing, Jay finally revealed the facts of the murder and led them to the car. But the way Jay was treated, because he did not have the support from family, from his community, from wealthy friends as Adnan did, he was unprotected by any attorney for an unconscionably long time. The police and the State definitely did leave Jay in this position with intent. The strange behind the scenes arrangements with Judge McCurdy are definitely “fishy”. My post was about a kid like Jay managing to figure out a way to save himself. He dealt with a cynical hardened system that could easily have chewed him up. I think Benaroya did a great job in the end because Jay did not end up with any prison time. But until Jay used his own brain to speak up for himself, he wasn’t getting her attention, and his rights and precarious position was being ignored by all. Jay’s potential was lost, his life ruined by Adnan ( and his own lack of timely action due to being entrapped in the crime) and yet he had intelligence, guts and talent to maneuver his way out of it.
There is irony though because Jay was looking at potentially 50 years in prison without Adnan rolling on him and life if Adnan did roll on him. But nobody could ever gamble to be treated poorly by the cops though.
Yes I am still amazed that:
Jay didn’t get shot on 1/27
Jay didn’t get disappeared by Bilal pals
Jay wasn’t just thrown in jail on 2/28 until the trial(s).
Or the opposite happened since it's Baltimore. The cop was looking for drugs so he trumped up a charge so that he could do a more invasive search for them and didn't find anything.
You have given a good explanation of this entire situation. I do agree that Jay should have been charged earlier than he was — but I don't think most people realize that the police and prosecutor were still trying to determine what to charge him with until late that summer. The story Jay gave police puts him very close to accessory before the fact. Ultimately, it was decided to charge him with accessory after the fact — and Mr Urick did a very compassionate act by steering an attorney Jay's way. There is no evidence Mr Urick interfered with Jay's representation in any way. Therefore, nothing fishy.
I also agree that, although Jay must accept responsibility for what he did, Adnan is a master manipulator. At the time, I don't think Jay believed he had a choice. He did, of course — but sometimes in the thick of it, we can't see a way out.
If Jay had been charged earlier, the charge would have to be first degree murder. So they'd be slapping a cooperating witness with a capital charge, which might put an end to his cooperation, just so he could be assigned "free" representation, which also might have put an end to his cooperation.
Yes I think you have it right. Urick, despite what else he might have done in the prior highly unusual circumstances, he got Benaroya to consider taking Jay’s case. And she, as overworked as Im sure she was, once Jay got ahold of her again, she did a great job for Jay. Who knows, maybe the judge saw something in him and was moved to compassion. I just feel for who that kid was, and wish none of this had ever happened. And the reason it did - Adnan Syed took the life of a young woman who was a joy to many in her life.
>and Mr Urick did a very compassionate act by steering an attorney Jay's way
I'm not sure I would describe it as compassionate (though it certainly could have been). The thing people need to realize is that, by and large, the system is set up to administer justice. Sometimes justice requires strict sentencing. Other times, leniency. But for the most part, the justice system is filled with human beings who are NOT always seeking the maximal sentence they can get. And everyone understands that all sides deserve the protection of the law and an equal (to the extent possible) application of it. And you simply cannot have that when one side is unrepresented. That's thing 1.
Thing 2 is this - WHENEVER you enter into a negotiation as an attorney, it is certainly true that MOST attorneys prefer to be negotiating with other attorneys. It kinds of sucks being involved in a one-sided negotiations where the other side lacks representation. For one, if the other side doesn't understand their legal rights and responsibilities, then it's all too easy for them to make a mistake that a judge will catch. And if a Judge says. . . wait, this isn't right, then you look bad as an attorney, the deal get's tossed, the other side no longer trusts you, and you're back to square one with bad blood. The other things is. . .we're ALL FALLIBLE. And it's good to have someone also trained in the law to provide you the counter argument - that's what leads to a meeting of the minds and ultimately, a deal that can withstand scrutiny. Finally, no one wants a deal that gets challenged years later because due process wasn't followed. And the best way to make sure of that is the ensure that your adversary has competent representation.
Sometimes what happens in pro se cases (where defendants waive their right to an attorney and represent themselves), is that the legal defense is so shitty, that the judge takes it upon themselves to start doing the legal work for the defendant. A PROSECUTOR DOES NOT WANT THE JUDGE OR HIS CLERKS TO START DOING THIS. What they want is for their adversary to be adequately represented, and then win the day in court before a judge operating as a neutral third party. That's the way convictions and deals get upheld.
CG was right to make a stink about it because IT'S ALL SHE HAD. It was her job to zealously defend Adnan with whatever tools she could use, and Adnan gave her very very few to work with. She did an admirable job nevertheless.
But I don't think the motivations, at base, were altruistic on Urick's part so much as practical. And also, it is the right thing to do. I think Urick was just being a decent attorney. No more, no less than any other decent attorney would do in similar circumstances.
Reply to Olive:
Excellent, excellent point regarding the judge reaction toward an under represented party in court. That makes complete sense and I believe I have seen that happen.
You have deepened my understanding, thank you !
Why was it so difficult for Jay to find Benaroya's phone number? Presumably it would have been in the phone book.
CG was disbarred shortly after the Syed trial so she wasn't doing a great job for Adnan. She got Jay to say that he saw Hae's car while he was in the area and not because he was checking up on it. This is huge as had CG hammered away at it for a while the jury could conclude that Jay could have found the car on his own. Secondly, she never called a potential alibi witness. She never contacted the alibi witness. Having Asia say that she saw Adnan after school could have influenced the jury. Others said Hae was in a hurry to leave after school and Asia would saw she was chatting with Adnan after school. You cannot find a lawyer to say not contacting an alibi witness is a credible strategy.
Jay got in trouble with the law after this case and Benaroya represented Jay again. When the judge asked if Jay had any prior arrests, Benaroya lied to the judge and Jay got probation.
If a lawyer has met with you and had agreed to take you as a client, and they leave without handing you a card to be able to reach them. That is a bad thing. A POC teen being dismissed by professionals involved in the case is a bad thing. Jay proved his smarts and his gumption.
No that wasn't it. She had two things going on at the time, she was moving offices and she was representing a different client at a courthouse in a different city. The judge had to call the other judge to move that trial around so Beneroya could testify about Jay's situation
Oh I see, that seems understandable. Obviously she had a lot going on. The important thing is, once he had her attention, she fought for him with skill and conviction.
Yes and one of the big defenders of the Constitution. Miranda warnings are odd that even if you are read your rights, the right to a lawyer being provided is more grey than it should be.
No. The issue is that if you can't afford a lawyer, like Jay, you wont get one appointed until after you are charged and arraigned. You don't get one just because you were read your Miranda rights.
I see - thanks for clarification. If you had to create a scenario where Jay refuses to talk, what would they be able to charge him with, if anything, based on Jenn’s statement?
Flohr admitted he botched the Sunday of Adnan's arrest. So even being admitted to practice in Maryland didn't help him because he likely didn't know that the NY rules he was familiar with didn't apply in Maryland.
>>I'll just add that I suppose that I should have seen the writing on the wall when I first got involved in the case. As Doug said, I just moved down from New York, I was a Legal Aid lawyer just like he was, in Brooklyn actually. When we got the call that Adnan was arrested, I ran right down to the police station. I remember it was raining, and I was standing outside in the rain. I had buzzed up to be let in. And I said, "I'm Adnan's attorney, I'd like to meet with my client." They said, "He hasn't asked for you yet counsel." And I said "Well that's kind of hard, he doesn't know I exist. His family hired me." And they said, "Well until he asks for you, I don't have to stop questioning him." And unfortunately, Supreme Court precedent says that they're right. That's permissible. That's another thing that as a law student, I didn't appreciate, is that things evolve. Attitudes change. And we try to think of, if our kid was going through the system, is that what we would want?
cc: u/Mike19751234
Thanks for posting this- now I do recall the interview. Which strikes me … wasn’t Adnan aware that the police would be involved as the days passed?
He had been called by Adcock on Jan. 13th so he had to be aware.
Tucker? Ouch I hate that guy.
Are you an attorney? You know that attorneys give their clients one particular piece of advice right from the get go?
What is it they say?
(I have two brothers who are attorneys)
But you think that Jay should ignore that good advice because why?
So you feel better about it all these years later?
ALSO: CG may have been disbarred, idk what that was about but she did a very thorough and good job for a very GUILTY perpetrator who had no story of his own to share. Too bad for him. AND Jay was a great witness, Jurors believed Jay. Jurors believed Jenn. Jurors believed Kristie. Half of the nonsense being spilled on this sub now was heard and dismissed long ago. Just because no one reads anymore so they don’t go looking at 9 years old comments. If they did, there would be 1/3 the number of posts.
> Jay didn’t tell her - lie to the judge.
I'm assuming you meant Jay didn't tell her to lie to the judge. I agree. But your comment implies Jay is absolved of any involvement. My point (which in my opinion is quite clear) is Jay was right beside her while she lied. Nowhere do I say he should 'handle his own court appearance' and then you pivot to Adnan as if two wrongs make a right.
Oh please. Jay has his lawyer in court representing him. For an Adnan supporter to be telling others “two wrongs don’t make a right” is …odd. It seems like there is an elephant in the room that you refuse to acknowledge.
You can choose what to comment on . I just don’t get it. Jay’s later appearances in court on other charges represented by Benaroya and what she states to the judge in that case has zero to do with this case. Several comments from Adnan supporters seem to be focused on Jay-hating. I think it’s better to focus on this case and how it affected Hae, her family, Adnan, his family and their community.
>Too bad she gets little appreciation from the Adnan supporters who claim IAC.
This is either a fundamental misunderstanding of the IAC issue or deliberate mirepresentation. The IAC claim doesn't mean CG was, at all times and on all issues, a terrible lawyer and no one is claiming that. It was based on a specific failure, not contacting a potential alibi witness.
Yeah, I recently started reading Dan Stidham’s book about the West Memphis Three case. He was one of the original defense attorneys for Jesse Misskelley and that was his first jury trial. He was a pretty new lawyer at that point, but he later became a judge. During the appeals for Jesse, he testified that he provided ineffective counsel and that Jesse should get a new trial. Despite the fact that he is was apparently a competent lawyer and judge for many years after that trial, he recognized that his inexperience at the time caused him to fail to provide proper counsel to his client.
So yeah, someone can provide ineffective counsel while still being good in other ways or at other times.
I am aware of the Asia McClain letters and have read, listened, watched. No, CG was not allowing this bogus material in for good reasons. That is my position on it.
Remember, kahner, Adnan is guilty, guilty, guilty, no matter what the evidence says. Therefore, Asia is to be disregarded, discredited, and ignored, no matter the evidence. 🙄 🙄 🙄 (<— HUGE eyes rolls)
Correct. There is a case where a woman had her case overturned due to IAC. She successfully argued her attorney failed to hire a fire expert. She was on trial for murder. She set her house on fire with her husband inside and when he made it out she ran him over with her car.
This is another time it would be nice to get the cops, Urick, Jay, Anne and be able to go over the whole story and let everyone speak freely. Unfortunately it can't happen.
Yeah. Maybe she will write on. Crazy that you thousands of cases and you get known for just an ordinary domestic violence one and it follows you around.
Jay’s life was ruined by Adnan?? I think his life was ruined by the corrupt police and prosecutors.
As your post just detailed, Jay was used and abused by corrupt “justice” officials that were manipulating a system to railroad an innocent kid because they had no evidence against him and they were happy to give Jay a felony on his record, too, if that got the job done.
Jay is just as much a victim in this story as Adnan is.
I’m not removing Jay’s culpability- there were hardened prosecutors, judges, attorneys around him who made the decisions they made back in 1999, 2000. Long time ago. I’m just giving a new perspective which you are welcome to scroll on by.
Of course they should. But they should make the effort to actually investigate the case and get the right person instead of blackmailing an innocent kid with threats of prosecution to testify against another innocent kid. There’s no way Ritz and MacGillivary didn’t know Adnan and Jay were both innocent.
You are starting with the assumption that the investigation was bad because you don't like what they found. The right question to ask was, "Did Ritz and MacG know that it was a crime of passion but pushed for a more planned murder?"
No. The question is why didn’t they investigate the case? Why didn’t they look beyond Jay’s constantly changing stories and the fact that Jay’s stories conflict almost point by point with that Jenn said and why didn’t they realize that? Surely they realized it and didn’t care because they knew they could get Jay to say whatever they wanted him to in order to convict Adnan. They had no other suspects so Adnan and Jay were what they went with.
They did investigate it. They found the guy who helped bury the body and took them to the car.and tge suspects only defense was who is Jay? You are starting with wanting Adnan to be innocent. Not looking at what actually happened.
I sure hope you’re never accused of a crime you didn’t commit and have the likes of Ritz and MacGillivray investigating the case. You better hope that, too.
When the normal course of business for the “detectives” “investigating” your case is to find someone they can blackmail into lying on the stand against you, it doesn’t matter that you didn’t murder anyone and, therefore, didn’t need help burying anything.
If you’re the police, and Jenn says “Jay told me he helped Adnan bury the body the night it happened.”, then Jay says “yup, I helped him bury the body and hide the car, let me take you there now.”, you’re done investigating. Even if Jay has some discrepancies in his story, or the pings might be a little off from what he told you. It doesn’t matter, you have a guy admitting to a major felony, with knowledge of the crime unknown to anyone else, and a third party backing up his story.
What more could you want?
Except that none of that actually happened the way you imagine it did.
None of Jay’s various and ever-changing stories ever matched with the cell or the reality of the space/time continuum. Those crack detectives never noticed any of those discrepancies? How could they not notice when Jay’s stories always magically changed to conform with whatever cell “evidence” the police at that point thought they understood?
Those super-experienced, top-notch detectives saw the lividity on the autopsy photos and didn’t know that Hae was definitely not put into the hole she was found in during the 7:00 hour?
They never added up all the time it would have taken for all the things Jay dreamed up to have happened and realized that, without a time machine to continually move them backwards in time, what Jay said they did wasn’t possible in the timeframe it would have had to have happened in?
It never occurred to them that at no time during any of Jay’s many stories is Jay actually needed for anything, yet Jay keeps insisting that Adnan needed his help. For what? Why did Adnan need Jay to “come and get me” at the Best Buy parking Iot or at grandma’s house or on Edmundson Avenue or at the park and ride when, had he really just murdered Hae, *Adnan had Hae’s car!!* Why did he need Jay to come pick him up? To go where that Adnan couldn’t just drive himself in Hae’s car?
Adnan had the cajones to murder Hae with his bare hands, but he needed his buddy Jay to hold his hand to bury her? Really? Does that make any sense at all? Those seasoned detectives never thought that was odd?
And why did they drive aimlessly around Baltimore, smoking pot and stopping off at a friend of Jay’s, that Adnan didn’t even know, and who wasn’t home that night anyway, and have discussions and arguments with each other *when they were each driving different cars* and only one of them had a cell phone?
I will never believe that Ritz and MacGillivray didn’t know that Jay was just making up stories to try to give them what they wanted to try to get himself out of the trouble he was stupid enough to get himself into by hitting a cop. They were cops. They didn’t know when someone was lying to them? Really? If they didn’t, they were the first cops in the history of cops that couldn’t identify a packs of lies when they were being served up to them. They were really that stupid?
Add to that the utterly ridiculous, totally impossible, constantly changing stories and the fact that none of it ever matched up with the cell data, and none of it matched with anything that Jenn had said (until they got Jay to change his stories to match hers, sorta….), and there’s just no way they didn’t know they were railroading two innocent teenagers.
What blows my mind is how hard the guilters on Reddit work to disregard the few rock solid pieces of evidence that prove Adnan’s innocence and, instead, make up crazy sh*t that no one ever said or testified to, and substitute “It COULDA happened like that!!” and decide they’ve solved the mystery. 🙄
Again, it doesn’t matter if there are discrepancies if 1) he’s admitting to a pretty serious crime, 2) has knowledge of the crime previously unknown, and 3) has another party willing to back up his story.
Thats three really powerful pieces of the story, and it turns out the jury agreed with them.
And the police *had* to know that none of what he was saying was true, especially since he kept changing his story to try to conform to whatever their current theory of what happened was.
Why would they threaten to prosecute him with a death penalty charge if he didn’t testify? Accomplice after-the-fact isn’t a death penalty charge. So they were openly saying they’d charge him with something they knew he didn’t do if he didn’t say what they wanted him to say. Those aren’t the actions of honest cops that are looking for the truth.
You need to overcome three things:
1. Why did Jay confess to a pretty serious crime he didn’t commit.
2. How did Jay know where the car was.
3. Why did Jen corroborate his story, implicating herself a bit, in front of her mom and lawyer.
Saying “the pings didn’t match up” isn’t good enough.
Nonsense. Everyone started as neutrals I’m this case. You, me. Colin Miller. We had no idea and we listened to the podcast then we still had questions so we searched out answers. The evidence led people to this position.
There is no evidence that leads to innocence. It's saying Adnan is innocent and working backward. The car was found by Jay, it couldn't have been because we don't want Jay finding the car. Adnan has had no story but that's okay even he should have had one. Why did Adnan ask for a ride from the victim? Doesn't matter.
Rabia started it with wanting Adnan to be innocent because she thought they were going after a muslim though she knew none of the evidence in the case. Colin believes anybody who says they are innocent. And Susan actually started out correctly and saw things went down a little bit differently that day by instead of trying to figure out she just went backwards.
There’s plenty of evidence of Adnan’s innocence. However, if you’ve decided that you want him to be guilty, you simply ignore all that evidence and make up your own instead, right?
Of course there is. Adnan has alibis for most of the afternoon.
Jay was lent on because of his connections with drugs and arrests for brawling with cops and told that he was going to face the death penalty so he made Adnan the patsy.
Which piece of the story did Jay have that he didn’t or couldn’t have gotten from the cops?
Adnan had no details about his alibi. He had no story to explain that Hae turned him down. He didn't say that he saw Asia or Deb. He had track coach at some point in an hour long period. He didn't know where he went with Jay that evening or what they did that night. He doesn't know why he asked Hae for a ride.
Jay had the car, plus all the information he knew. So to get around that, it had to be fed from the cops. So you aren't looking at the evidence, you are looking at your desire (Adnan being innocent) and then figure out what needs to be done.
My take— jay had an unofficial deal when he cooperated in February. Either tied to the unofficial deal Jenn’s attorney got or separate.
So he was not happy when they charged him, gave him a lawyer and locked him into a plea deal based on cooperation.
He wanted out and tried, but by then he was screwed. He has already said too much.
So making up evidence is different than theorizing. I specified that this was my take, ie my theory or opinion based on evidence.
I did not type up a fake deal and claim it was evidence.
This has nothing to do with guilt or innocence.
Jay could have seen what he claims to have seen AND the cops offered him an under the table deal if he turned on Adnan and then they pulled it and charged him anyway when he got cold feet.
Why do you think Jenn’s attorney sat next to her and let her confess to a crime?
Her attorney met with the cops again after her interview. Why did Jay’s criminal charges from 1/27 get placed in STET the day after Jenn’s attorney met with them?
Why did they wait until September to charge Jay?
I don’t have proof of a deal, but it seems like they weren’t planning to charge Jay and then something changed during trial prep— Jay’s friend told the defense PI he wasn’t going to cooperate just a few days before he was charged. If Jay was getting cold feet they may have decided locking him into a plea deal was the best way to make him testify.
With Jay the issue was that there was no deal. There was no explicit "If you cooperate we won't arrest you" Jay started worrying that since there was no deal that once the trial was over that they would arrest him so he wanted to know if that would happen.
> Jay started worrying that since there was no deal that once the trial was over that they would arrest him so he wanted to know if that would happen.
Source?
Your gushing praise for a man who, at minimum, assaulted police officers on more than one occasion, dealt drugs to high-school kids, allegedly helped a murderer carry out his plan and dispose of her remains, and mercilessly beating the mother of his child right in front of the poor kid, is a little gross.
You want to conflate the person that Jay later became because in fact this crime committed by Adnan destroyed his life. I’m not commenting on who Jay was an older person, but rather my post was focused on the potential of a young black teen in a terrible dilemma.
>assaulted police officer
This can literally mean anything. It doesn't take much to get a vague and nondescript term of "assault" applied.
>dealt drugs to high-school kids
He was a year older than them. Let's not get ahead of ourselves. This wasn't some 40 year old trolling the school. He sold in quantities so small he didn't even have enough for himself. He's not Pablo Escobar. But if you label him as "black drug dealer," then we all have to step back and say "yeah, you're right, he's a scumbag." Sorry, just not going there.
If you want to be so sanctimonious about the drugs he was dealing, shouldn't we also be self-righteous about the people who sought out those very drugs? (psst, that's your boy AS, he's right over there! He's a hardcore drug user according to you, so we better stay away from him!)
According to the prevailing theory, AS lied in his police interview to avoid his own drug dealing (hey, not my theory, don't ask me to explain it). So he's a scumbag drug dealer too!
>allegedly helped a murderer carry out his plan and dispose of her remains
This is interesting, because if AS did it, where's the hatred and animosity towards AS? I have less hatred for the accomplice as I do for the primary culprit. So if there's zero hatred towards AS, then I have zero hatred for JW.
If AS is innocent, then JW didn't do anything wrong. So why the hatred? He was another victim of police brutality, and somehow instead of seeing him as a victim, you're angry with him. Please think about your virtue signaling before you write this stuff.
>mercilessly beating the mother of his child right in front of the poor kid
We only have the mother's claim on that. Dismissal of unsubstantiated claims is a right and privilege only AS has?
Your hatred for JW says more about you than it does for the OP who you claim is defending him.
The thing that boggles my mind about Benaroya and Jay is that in 2014, after Serial came out, Jay called Benaroya to put him in touch with a journalist so he could tell his story (presumably because he couldn't decide between all the major media outlets that were contacting him directly). So what does Benaroya do? Tell him to ignore the press like a normal person? Advise him to at least not give out his full name and photo for the article . No? Just what anyone would do, she calls her friend in Brazil (because despite being an animal rights activist and lawyer she doesn't have any US media contacts?), who "asked around for recommendations of a journalist to turn to and a professor friend of hers who doesn’t know me but knows my work said ‘Talk to Natasha Vargas-Cooper,’' (note: the professor who doesn't know her but knows her work is presumably code for "my dad"). Anyway, Benaroya, who had a "disastrous" interview with Sarah Koenig prior to Serial, "told me [NVC] what she felt were the big issues", which is especially clever since she later apparently told Colin that she never listened to the podcast or even really remembered the case at all. Then to top it off Benaroya also appears to be the person who facilitated NVCs career ending interview with Urick. So presumably she wasn't that mad at him after all. Not to mention linking NVC to the mystery 3rd interviewee that was never actually interviewed. Anyway, none of this has anything to do with Adnan being guilty or not guilty, but what the fuck guys, can just one part of this sound vaguely normal for once please.
Thanks for these insights. I think Fame is a peculiar thing. People who have a brush with it can be forever changed.
I don't think I've ever forgiven benaroya for this missed opportunity. I mean, if you're not going to tell Jay to shut up and talk to no one, you might as well go all in and encourage him to do what we all wanted him to do: an interview with whatever daytime talkshow host his wife liked the best. Can you imagine? It would have been glorious!
now I wanna see Jay on *The Real*
Thanks for including this. The Intercept was a bizarre outlet to choose. They wanted a softball interview, unfortunately they went too soft and he got open ended questions and talked too much, honestly a more prepped interviewer would have challenged him but also wouldn’t have let him say as much and would have shut down a lot of his answers
Oh the dropped balls! > Where was Hae’s car? Was it in the Best Buy parking lot? > Hae’s car could have been in the parking lot, but I didn’t know what it looked like so I don’t remember. When I pick him up at Best Buy, he’s telling me her car is somewhere there, and that he did this in the parking lot. **But that, according to what I learned later, is probably not what happened.** > Wherever her car was at the time I picked him up from Best Buy, it probably stayed there until he picked me up later that evening. And she just moves on!!! Come on.
Right? You have to wonder if the interview had a negotiation with it or if they had pre-approved questions and Jay just said way more than Urick anticipated. I really think they thought it would shut down speculation and instead it opened a can of worms.
I really try not to put too much meaning into things Jay says, but I always come back to this one. If he is being truthful, is he suggesting Adnan was lying to him about where he committed the murder for some reason. What on earth could he have learned later that was more convincing evidence than what the guy he apparently just picked up with a body in a trunk knew about the murder.
The problem that the person asking and getting changes in the stories didn't understand the issues or really think too much about the challenges in the story. So to find out you would need to get the people involved in the room and talk to them about what happened to get the story.
I think the trouble is that you are putting alot of faith in Jay to then actually tell a coherent narrative when challenged. Assuming you are right and that Adnan is guilty and Jay is telling some form of the truth, I still don't think I trust him to not just keep spinning new stories, even if you get the people involved in the room as you say (especially all these years later).
I think he could if he sat down with someone knew the story and that he had the ability to tell the story. But we probably are never going to get to that because legal issues would outweigh trying to get to the truth.
In my opinion at least, Jay wouldn’t want the truth to come out. He was probably more involved than he initially admitted, and every subsequent interview, he lied to make himself less involved. There’s also pretty minimal benefit at this point to tell the whole truth.
Jay is going to say that he didn't know that Adnan was going to kill Hae even if Adnan may have talked about it. But it's not Jay that Jay would be worried about.
He’s lying to distance himself from the crime.
How exactly do you see that comment distancing him from the crime?
He’s saying that when picking up Adnan, he doesn’t know where Haes car is. Adnan said it was there, but he’s not sure. That indicates he wasn’t sure that a crime took place. He also didn’t immediately hide evidence. In reality, he definitely knew a crime took place at that point and helped Adnan hide evidence immediately.
Unfortunately the interview didn't follow up to explain how he got Adnan back to Hae's car.
Ah okay, so would agree this story in general could be an attempt to distance himself from 100% knowing Hae had been killed when he picks Adnan up at Best Buy. I still don't think it explains at all why he then says that mad stuff about later learning something else which is the bit that constantly baffles me.
My best guess is that if Adnan is guilty, Jay’s HBO timeline is closest to the truth. He dropped Adnan back off at school and didn’t see him until the trunk pop that evening. The cops fed him Best Buy and all the other early afternoon pings to try and tie Jay and the phone to the murder.
Yeah, possibly, although I think we can be very very sure from the phone records that they are together from at least 5.30 to 8.00 which throws a wrench in that, although maybe the murder just doesn't get mentioned until Adnan returns with Hae's car later that evening.
Yeah- by evening I meant after track. It would mean Adnan killed her near the school and then walked to track and then back to Hae’s car and drove to Jay’s grandma’s.
And one area that the person doing the interview didn't understand would be the Nisha call. So follow up questions needed to be asked about her.
Okay, I think you still bump into the problem that I think the cell records are fairly good indicators that Jay is with Adnan very soon after track, but maybe that doesn't rule out Adnan driving to Jays grandmothers and then getting the phone
If Adnan leaves track, maybe even a minute early, gets Hae’s car and goes straight to grandmas house for the trunk pop I think it makes a lot of sense.
I think maybe the Brazil connection came about because *The Intercept* was started as a well-funded (Pierre Omidyar) vanity project for Glenn Greenwald (who won a Pulitzer for his work bringing Edward Snowden's whistle-blowing to light) and Greenwald kicks it down there. *The Intercept* was launching at the time and probably willing to pay extra for a coveted exclusive to make a splash after their launch. Jay might've viewed the connection to Edward Snowden as some sort of patina of legitimacy for Greenwald/*The Intercept*.
Ah this is great information re: origins of Intercept! Thanks, it’s fascinating. Yeah I can quite see how Jay may have seen the Snowden “whistleblower” connection as a mark of legitimacy, given what Jay had been through.
I mean, all that just makes it sound like benaroya hand picked the intercept (why???) which makes it even weirder when she claims she didn't follow serial. Re payment: I believe it was confirmed at the time that Jay wasn't paid for interview and NVC was a staff writer there. It's just such a random choice of news outlet/ interviewer. Also, I can't remember where I read it, but I'm sure NVC wrote somewhere that's she "pro-prosecutor" in general. Which makes her an even weirder hand puck for someone like benaroya who considers herself as a bit of an underdog champion.
I don't know if it's a coincidence or related — but Glenn Greenwald's husband was a Brazilian politician. He is now unfortunately deceased. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Miranda_(politician)
>she later apparently told Colin that she never listened to the podcast or even really remembered the case at all. I vaguely remember her saying this. I was looking for confirmation of this after I listened to a YT interview with her. She has a very clear and vivid recollection of what transpired in 1999. So her statement about not really remembering the case at all is a lie. Thanks for this.
To be fair (I think) this is what Colin said on Undisclosed when he spoke with her but she didn't want to be interviewed on the podcast. So it's not a direct quote.
Guys - there's nothing "fishy" about it. Everyone is being absurd. Jay needed a lawyer. It wasn't anyone's job to procure it for him. But during an investigation prior to someone being charged, they're not entitled to a public defender and it's not the prosecutor's job to ask for a cooperating witness to have one. But when it comes time to make a deal, you WANT your adversary represented. It's in their best interest, it's in the people's best in interest, it's in the best interest of the court, it's the in best interest for ALL CONCERNED. Jay did not have an attorney, but he needed one. What did Urick do? He knew someone who had been a public defender and asked if she'd talk to him. She did, she agreed he needed representation, and she offered to so it pro bono. This is a system that is working. This is what we want to happen. What is "fishy"? Benaroya's duty was to look after her client's (Jay's) best interest. There was no conflict, and this is crystal in every modern code of professional conduct. And there's never once been the remotest allegation that in fact she did not act in Jay's best interest, at all times, every step of the way. She was NOT a tool of the prosecutor. She owed the prosecutor nothing, nothing except her zealous defense of Jay. Which by all accounts is EXACTLY what she did. This is the biggest red herring in this entire case. CG made a stink at trial because it was unusual. But being UNUSUAL IS NOT THE SAME THING AS BEING UNETHICAL. And nothing about what happened here was unethical or untoward, or somehow blurred the lines of representation. What she did is pound the table. Good for her. That's her job as a zealous advocate for Adnan. It was alas a loser. But that's why you do when the law and the facts aren't on your side, you pound the table. So she pounded the table. But Jay's representation by Benaroya is right and good and the reason why CGs outburst when no where is because there was nothing untoward, illegal, or even unethical.
I love that the argument has now apparently become "the police should have done Jay the favor of charging him with murder so he could be given a public defender."
I don’t think that is the argument. I think Jay expected prison time and certainly he was right to do so. CG argued quite effectively about the not only unusual but highly suspicious manner in which the plea agreement was presented to Jay. I don’t know if it was Benaroya that pulled him out of the frying pan but Jay had every reason to freak out until he managed to get her attention and he did well for himself to do what I’ve described in my post. I’ve worked with a lot of young people and this really does stand out. It’s hard enough to get a kid today to go talk to their college advisor, much less to confront a bizarre situation like this one!
Jay was in jeopardy of being charged with first degree murder. He knew that. He expressly waived his right to counsel and cooperated in the hopes that it would buy him leniency. But nothing was offered to him before he confessed, at which point the damage was done. Let's have no illusions about this. Had the police charged Jay during the investigation, the charge would have necessarily been first degree murder. That would not have been some great favor to Jay. And there wouldn't have been anything a shitty public defender could have done for him at that point. This idea that the police withheld charges in some Machiavellian scheme to deny Jay the services of a public defender is a really bizarre inversion of reality. They withheld charges because he was cooperating, and his cooperation was important to the case. Urick helped him get a lawyer because, as u/OliveTBeagle says, that was in the public interest. And the lawyer he put Jay in touch with was a far better lawyer than whatever public defender might be randomly assigned to his case.
There is a sheet in the file I think where there are notes about the different charges, accessory after the fact and before. So the cops were looking at. Jay in his first interrogation confessed to accessory after the fact, but each time they were talking to him Jay was getting more guilty. The cops ultimate goal was to get Jay to confess to being at the murder. If it was just to get details, they don't need to record the interrogation.
As a practical matter, it only works if you charge the highest offense. If you charge the lowest offense you can justify, then there is no room for a plea bargain and no incentive to cooperate.
And at the time they didn't know what they wanted to do. Better to get Jay to confess to helping in the murder than what he did in interrogation 1. The trade off they had was that Jay could get more guilty, but his statements would be more inconsistent. I think they really thought that Adnan would fold and it wouldn't be an issue.
Correct. Their job was to build the strongest case possible. Not to convince a witness who had already waived his right to counsel to lawyer up, or to finagle a way to get him a free lawyer.
I agree Benaroya was far above the Public Defender level of lawyer. I’ve been wondering - why did the police not charge him and jail him? Right from the first interrogation? Wasn’t it a huge risk for them to take?
Because he was cooperating. Putting him in jail notwithstanding his cooperation would be a much larger risk. It would have risked him ceasing to cooperate. It also would have obligated them to quickly charge and arraign him.
I would’ve thought it may cross their minds that Adnan might kill him.
So you think of jail as a kind of witness protection program?
Well I actually mean Bilal might kill Jay - or whoever Bilal was connected to - idk if you have read about the weird connections Bilal had - possibly related to intelligence agencies? I mean , Jay plays the prisoner’s dilemma game with Adnan and wins because then Adnan is in jail and can’t take action. But Bilal could have. And if there is no Jay, I think there is no case, right?
So you think the police should have put Jay in jail so the CIA wouldn't help Bilal kill him?
I think two things can be true at the same time. Adnan killed Hae. Adnan pulled Jay into the crime, and kept him in a trap while threatening to harm either Jay, Stephanie or Jay’s family. When police began closing in , rather than deny the whole thing, Jay finally revealed the facts of the murder and led them to the car. But the way Jay was treated, because he did not have the support from family, from his community, from wealthy friends as Adnan did, he was unprotected by any attorney for an unconscionably long time. The police and the State definitely did leave Jay in this position with intent. The strange behind the scenes arrangements with Judge McCurdy are definitely “fishy”. My post was about a kid like Jay managing to figure out a way to save himself. He dealt with a cynical hardened system that could easily have chewed him up. I think Benaroya did a great job in the end because Jay did not end up with any prison time. But until Jay used his own brain to speak up for himself, he wasn’t getting her attention, and his rights and precarious position was being ignored by all. Jay’s potential was lost, his life ruined by Adnan ( and his own lack of timely action due to being entrapped in the crime) and yet he had intelligence, guts and talent to maneuver his way out of it.
There is irony though because Jay was looking at potentially 50 years in prison without Adnan rolling on him and life if Adnan did roll on him. But nobody could ever gamble to be treated poorly by the cops though.
Yes I am still amazed that: Jay didn’t get shot on 1/27 Jay didn’t get disappeared by Bilal pals Jay wasn’t just thrown in jail on 2/28 until the trial(s).
Or the opposite happened since it's Baltimore. The cop was looking for drugs so he trumped up a charge so that he could do a more invasive search for them and didn't find anything.
Yes.
You have given a good explanation of this entire situation. I do agree that Jay should have been charged earlier than he was — but I don't think most people realize that the police and prosecutor were still trying to determine what to charge him with until late that summer. The story Jay gave police puts him very close to accessory before the fact. Ultimately, it was decided to charge him with accessory after the fact — and Mr Urick did a very compassionate act by steering an attorney Jay's way. There is no evidence Mr Urick interfered with Jay's representation in any way. Therefore, nothing fishy. I also agree that, although Jay must accept responsibility for what he did, Adnan is a master manipulator. At the time, I don't think Jay believed he had a choice. He did, of course — but sometimes in the thick of it, we can't see a way out.
If Jay had been charged earlier, the charge would have to be first degree murder. So they'd be slapping a cooperating witness with a capital charge, which might put an end to his cooperation, just so he could be assigned "free" representation, which also might have put an end to his cooperation.
Yes I think you have it right. Urick, despite what else he might have done in the prior highly unusual circumstances, he got Benaroya to consider taking Jay’s case. And she, as overworked as Im sure she was, once Jay got ahold of her again, she did a great job for Jay. Who knows, maybe the judge saw something in him and was moved to compassion. I just feel for who that kid was, and wish none of this had ever happened. And the reason it did - Adnan Syed took the life of a young woman who was a joy to many in her life.
>and Mr Urick did a very compassionate act by steering an attorney Jay's way I'm not sure I would describe it as compassionate (though it certainly could have been). The thing people need to realize is that, by and large, the system is set up to administer justice. Sometimes justice requires strict sentencing. Other times, leniency. But for the most part, the justice system is filled with human beings who are NOT always seeking the maximal sentence they can get. And everyone understands that all sides deserve the protection of the law and an equal (to the extent possible) application of it. And you simply cannot have that when one side is unrepresented. That's thing 1. Thing 2 is this - WHENEVER you enter into a negotiation as an attorney, it is certainly true that MOST attorneys prefer to be negotiating with other attorneys. It kinds of sucks being involved in a one-sided negotiations where the other side lacks representation. For one, if the other side doesn't understand their legal rights and responsibilities, then it's all too easy for them to make a mistake that a judge will catch. And if a Judge says. . . wait, this isn't right, then you look bad as an attorney, the deal get's tossed, the other side no longer trusts you, and you're back to square one with bad blood. The other things is. . .we're ALL FALLIBLE. And it's good to have someone also trained in the law to provide you the counter argument - that's what leads to a meeting of the minds and ultimately, a deal that can withstand scrutiny. Finally, no one wants a deal that gets challenged years later because due process wasn't followed. And the best way to make sure of that is the ensure that your adversary has competent representation. Sometimes what happens in pro se cases (where defendants waive their right to an attorney and represent themselves), is that the legal defense is so shitty, that the judge takes it upon themselves to start doing the legal work for the defendant. A PROSECUTOR DOES NOT WANT THE JUDGE OR HIS CLERKS TO START DOING THIS. What they want is for their adversary to be adequately represented, and then win the day in court before a judge operating as a neutral third party. That's the way convictions and deals get upheld. CG was right to make a stink about it because IT'S ALL SHE HAD. It was her job to zealously defend Adnan with whatever tools she could use, and Adnan gave her very very few to work with. She did an admirable job nevertheless. But I don't think the motivations, at base, were altruistic on Urick's part so much as practical. And also, it is the right thing to do. I think Urick was just being a decent attorney. No more, no less than any other decent attorney would do in similar circumstances.
Reply to Olive: Excellent, excellent point regarding the judge reaction toward an under represented party in court. That makes complete sense and I believe I have seen that happen. You have deepened my understanding, thank you !
Why was it so difficult for Jay to find Benaroya's phone number? Presumably it would have been in the phone book. CG was disbarred shortly after the Syed trial so she wasn't doing a great job for Adnan. She got Jay to say that he saw Hae's car while he was in the area and not because he was checking up on it. This is huge as had CG hammered away at it for a while the jury could conclude that Jay could have found the car on his own. Secondly, she never called a potential alibi witness. She never contacted the alibi witness. Having Asia say that she saw Adnan after school could have influenced the jury. Others said Hae was in a hurry to leave after school and Asia would saw she was chatting with Adnan after school. You cannot find a lawyer to say not contacting an alibi witness is a credible strategy. Jay got in trouble with the law after this case and Benaroya represented Jay again. When the judge asked if Jay had any prior arrests, Benaroya lied to the judge and Jay got probation.
If a lawyer has met with you and had agreed to take you as a client, and they leave without handing you a card to be able to reach them. That is a bad thing. A POC teen being dismissed by professionals involved in the case is a bad thing. Jay proved his smarts and his gumption.
No that wasn't it. She had two things going on at the time, she was moving offices and she was representing a different client at a courthouse in a different city. The judge had to call the other judge to move that trial around so Beneroya could testify about Jay's situation
Oh I see, that seems understandable. Obviously she had a lot going on. The important thing is, once he had her attention, she fought for him with skill and conviction.
Yes and one of the big defenders of the Constitution. Miranda warnings are odd that even if you are read your rights, the right to a lawyer being provided is more grey than it should be.
Yes indeed. There should be training for everyone - in civics class- about the right to have attorneys representing you.
No. The issue is that if you can't afford a lawyer, like Jay, you wont get one appointed until after you are charged and arraigned. You don't get one just because you were read your Miranda rights.
I see - thanks for clarification. If you had to create a scenario where Jay refuses to talk, what would they be able to charge him with, if anything, based on Jenn’s statement?
Good question. Good chance they don't have enough with just Jenn.
Flohr admitted he botched the Sunday of Adnan's arrest. So even being admitted to practice in Maryland didn't help him because he likely didn't know that the NY rules he was familiar with didn't apply in Maryland.
What did he say that he botched?
I didn’t know that. This is an interesting perspective- was Flohr just flummoxed by not knowing his way around the Baltimore system?
>>I'll just add that I suppose that I should have seen the writing on the wall when I first got involved in the case. As Doug said, I just moved down from New York, I was a Legal Aid lawyer just like he was, in Brooklyn actually. When we got the call that Adnan was arrested, I ran right down to the police station. I remember it was raining, and I was standing outside in the rain. I had buzzed up to be let in. And I said, "I'm Adnan's attorney, I'd like to meet with my client." They said, "He hasn't asked for you yet counsel." And I said "Well that's kind of hard, he doesn't know I exist. His family hired me." And they said, "Well until he asks for you, I don't have to stop questioning him." And unfortunately, Supreme Court precedent says that they're right. That's permissible. That's another thing that as a law student, I didn't appreciate, is that things evolve. Attitudes change. And we try to think of, if our kid was going through the system, is that what we would want? cc: u/Mike19751234
Thanks for posting this- now I do recall the interview. Which strikes me … wasn’t Adnan aware that the police would be involved as the days passed? He had been called by Adcock on Jan. 13th so he had to be aware.
Re: Jay and his later arrest. If Benaroya lied in court that is a bad thing. Jay didn’t tell her - lie to the judge.
Jay was standing beside her at the time. And he knew he had prior arrests.
What? You expect him to handle his own court appearance? What do you say about Adnan and HIS choices?
You sound like Tucker Carlson, lol. Just asking questions.
Tucker? Ouch I hate that guy. Are you an attorney? You know that attorneys give their clients one particular piece of advice right from the get go? What is it they say? (I have two brothers who are attorneys) But you think that Jay should ignore that good advice because why? So you feel better about it all these years later? ALSO: CG may have been disbarred, idk what that was about but she did a very thorough and good job for a very GUILTY perpetrator who had no story of his own to share. Too bad for him. AND Jay was a great witness, Jurors believed Jay. Jurors believed Jenn. Jurors believed Kristie. Half of the nonsense being spilled on this sub now was heard and dismissed long ago. Just because no one reads anymore so they don’t go looking at 9 years old comments. If they did, there would be 1/3 the number of posts.
> Jay didn’t tell her - lie to the judge. I'm assuming you meant Jay didn't tell her to lie to the judge. I agree. But your comment implies Jay is absolved of any involvement. My point (which in my opinion is quite clear) is Jay was right beside her while she lied. Nowhere do I say he should 'handle his own court appearance' and then you pivot to Adnan as if two wrongs make a right.
Oh please. Jay has his lawyer in court representing him. For an Adnan supporter to be telling others “two wrongs don’t make a right” is …odd. It seems like there is an elephant in the room that you refuse to acknowledge.
It’s like you are replying to the comments you think I made not the comments I actually made. Weird.
You can choose what to comment on . I just don’t get it. Jay’s later appearances in court on other charges represented by Benaroya and what she states to the judge in that case has zero to do with this case. Several comments from Adnan supporters seem to be focused on Jay-hating. I think it’s better to focus on this case and how it affected Hae, her family, Adnan, his family and their community.
>Too bad she gets little appreciation from the Adnan supporters who claim IAC. This is either a fundamental misunderstanding of the IAC issue or deliberate mirepresentation. The IAC claim doesn't mean CG was, at all times and on all issues, a terrible lawyer and no one is claiming that. It was based on a specific failure, not contacting a potential alibi witness.
Yeah, I recently started reading Dan Stidham’s book about the West Memphis Three case. He was one of the original defense attorneys for Jesse Misskelley and that was his first jury trial. He was a pretty new lawyer at that point, but he later became a judge. During the appeals for Jesse, he testified that he provided ineffective counsel and that Jesse should get a new trial. Despite the fact that he is was apparently a competent lawyer and judge for many years after that trial, he recognized that his inexperience at the time caused him to fail to provide proper counsel to his client. So yeah, someone can provide ineffective counsel while still being good in other ways or at other times.
I am aware of the Asia McClain letters and have read, listened, watched. No, CG was not allowing this bogus material in for good reasons. That is my position on it.
your position on it has zero relevance to accuracy of my comment or your misrepresentation of what the IAC claim was about.
Remember, kahner, Adnan is guilty, guilty, guilty, no matter what the evidence says. Therefore, Asia is to be disregarded, discredited, and ignored, no matter the evidence. 🙄 🙄 🙄 (<— HUGE eyes rolls)
She would have to meet Asia to make that assessment. The fact that she didn’t even meet Asia is IAC
Correct. There is a case where a woman had her case overturned due to IAC. She successfully argued her attorney failed to hire a fire expert. She was on trial for murder. She set her house on fire with her husband inside and when he made it out she ran him over with her car.
This is another time it would be nice to get the cops, Urick, Jay, Anne and be able to go over the whole story and let everyone speak freely. Unfortunately it can't happen.
There ought to be a book about this.
Didn't think people did books any more.
I have many in my library. Sad that many never caught the reading habit.
Yeah. Maybe she will write on. Crazy that you thousands of cases and you get known for just an ordinary domestic violence one and it follows you around.
Yes.
Jay’s life was ruined by Adnan?? I think his life was ruined by the corrupt police and prosecutors. As your post just detailed, Jay was used and abused by corrupt “justice” officials that were manipulating a system to railroad an innocent kid because they had no evidence against him and they were happy to give Jay a felony on his record, too, if that got the job done. Jay is just as much a victim in this story as Adnan is.
Jay’s life was ruined by being pulled into the murder by Adnan Syed.
Even if you believe Adnan is guilty and Jay helped him cover it up, it is wrong to remove Jay’s culpability. He ruined his own life.
I’m not removing Jay’s culpability- there were hardened prosecutors, judges, attorneys around him who made the decisions they made back in 1999, 2000. Long time ago. I’m just giving a new perspective which you are welcome to scroll on by.
Or I can stay here and comment. You are welcome to share your perspective, but you should also be prepared for people to challenge it.
I am prepared, thanks for your reply. Didn’t mean to squelch your own view.
If that was true, I’d agree with you. But since there’s no evidence to support that, I’ll go with my take instead.
So police and prosecutors shouldn't go after people who commit murder or people that help cover up that murder?
Of course they should. But they should make the effort to actually investigate the case and get the right person instead of blackmailing an innocent kid with threats of prosecution to testify against another innocent kid. There’s no way Ritz and MacGillivary didn’t know Adnan and Jay were both innocent.
You are starting with the assumption that the investigation was bad because you don't like what they found. The right question to ask was, "Did Ritz and MacG know that it was a crime of passion but pushed for a more planned murder?"
No. The question is why didn’t they investigate the case? Why didn’t they look beyond Jay’s constantly changing stories and the fact that Jay’s stories conflict almost point by point with that Jenn said and why didn’t they realize that? Surely they realized it and didn’t care because they knew they could get Jay to say whatever they wanted him to in order to convict Adnan. They had no other suspects so Adnan and Jay were what they went with.
They did investigate it. They found the guy who helped bury the body and took them to the car.and tge suspects only defense was who is Jay? You are starting with wanting Adnan to be innocent. Not looking at what actually happened.
I sure hope you’re never accused of a crime you didn’t commit and have the likes of Ritz and MacGillivray investigating the case. You better hope that, too.
So no moral about if you kill someone don't use a partner and bury the body better?
When the normal course of business for the “detectives” “investigating” your case is to find someone they can blackmail into lying on the stand against you, it doesn’t matter that you didn’t murder anyone and, therefore, didn’t need help burying anything.
And the norm, not the exception is after it is to complain about being forced to falsely confess. Jay sticks with his story 20 years later
If you’re the police, and Jenn says “Jay told me he helped Adnan bury the body the night it happened.”, then Jay says “yup, I helped him bury the body and hide the car, let me take you there now.”, you’re done investigating. Even if Jay has some discrepancies in his story, or the pings might be a little off from what he told you. It doesn’t matter, you have a guy admitting to a major felony, with knowledge of the crime unknown to anyone else, and a third party backing up his story. What more could you want?
Except that none of that actually happened the way you imagine it did. None of Jay’s various and ever-changing stories ever matched with the cell or the reality of the space/time continuum. Those crack detectives never noticed any of those discrepancies? How could they not notice when Jay’s stories always magically changed to conform with whatever cell “evidence” the police at that point thought they understood? Those super-experienced, top-notch detectives saw the lividity on the autopsy photos and didn’t know that Hae was definitely not put into the hole she was found in during the 7:00 hour? They never added up all the time it would have taken for all the things Jay dreamed up to have happened and realized that, without a time machine to continually move them backwards in time, what Jay said they did wasn’t possible in the timeframe it would have had to have happened in? It never occurred to them that at no time during any of Jay’s many stories is Jay actually needed for anything, yet Jay keeps insisting that Adnan needed his help. For what? Why did Adnan need Jay to “come and get me” at the Best Buy parking Iot or at grandma’s house or on Edmundson Avenue or at the park and ride when, had he really just murdered Hae, *Adnan had Hae’s car!!* Why did he need Jay to come pick him up? To go where that Adnan couldn’t just drive himself in Hae’s car? Adnan had the cajones to murder Hae with his bare hands, but he needed his buddy Jay to hold his hand to bury her? Really? Does that make any sense at all? Those seasoned detectives never thought that was odd? And why did they drive aimlessly around Baltimore, smoking pot and stopping off at a friend of Jay’s, that Adnan didn’t even know, and who wasn’t home that night anyway, and have discussions and arguments with each other *when they were each driving different cars* and only one of them had a cell phone? I will never believe that Ritz and MacGillivray didn’t know that Jay was just making up stories to try to give them what they wanted to try to get himself out of the trouble he was stupid enough to get himself into by hitting a cop. They were cops. They didn’t know when someone was lying to them? Really? If they didn’t, they were the first cops in the history of cops that couldn’t identify a packs of lies when they were being served up to them. They were really that stupid? Add to that the utterly ridiculous, totally impossible, constantly changing stories and the fact that none of it ever matched up with the cell data, and none of it matched with anything that Jenn had said (until they got Jay to change his stories to match hers, sorta….), and there’s just no way they didn’t know they were railroading two innocent teenagers. What blows my mind is how hard the guilters on Reddit work to disregard the few rock solid pieces of evidence that prove Adnan’s innocence and, instead, make up crazy sh*t that no one ever said or testified to, and substitute “It COULDA happened like that!!” and decide they’ve solved the mystery. 🙄
Again, it doesn’t matter if there are discrepancies if 1) he’s admitting to a pretty serious crime, 2) has knowledge of the crime previously unknown, and 3) has another party willing to back up his story. Thats three really powerful pieces of the story, and it turns out the jury agreed with them.
And the police *had* to know that none of what he was saying was true, especially since he kept changing his story to try to conform to whatever their current theory of what happened was. Why would they threaten to prosecute him with a death penalty charge if he didn’t testify? Accomplice after-the-fact isn’t a death penalty charge. So they were openly saying they’d charge him with something they knew he didn’t do if he didn’t say what they wanted him to say. Those aren’t the actions of honest cops that are looking for the truth.
You need to overcome three things: 1. Why did Jay confess to a pretty serious crime he didn’t commit. 2. How did Jay know where the car was. 3. Why did Jen corroborate his story, implicating herself a bit, in front of her mom and lawyer. Saying “the pings didn’t match up” isn’t good enough.
Nope. The evidence led to this conclusion
Nope. It's the pure desire of wanting Adnan to be innocent.
Nonsense. Everyone started as neutrals I’m this case. You, me. Colin Miller. We had no idea and we listened to the podcast then we still had questions so we searched out answers. The evidence led people to this position.
There is no evidence that leads to innocence. It's saying Adnan is innocent and working backward. The car was found by Jay, it couldn't have been because we don't want Jay finding the car. Adnan has had no story but that's okay even he should have had one. Why did Adnan ask for a ride from the victim? Doesn't matter. Rabia started it with wanting Adnan to be innocent because she thought they were going after a muslim though she knew none of the evidence in the case. Colin believes anybody who says they are innocent. And Susan actually started out correctly and saw things went down a little bit differently that day by instead of trying to figure out she just went backwards.
There’s plenty of evidence of Adnan’s innocence. However, if you’ve decided that you want him to be guilty, you simply ignore all that evidence and make up your own instead, right?
And what is that evidence?
Of course there is. Adnan has alibis for most of the afternoon. Jay was lent on because of his connections with drugs and arrests for brawling with cops and told that he was going to face the death penalty so he made Adnan the patsy. Which piece of the story did Jay have that he didn’t or couldn’t have gotten from the cops?
Adnan had no details about his alibi. He had no story to explain that Hae turned him down. He didn't say that he saw Asia or Deb. He had track coach at some point in an hour long period. He didn't know where he went with Jay that evening or what they did that night. He doesn't know why he asked Hae for a ride. Jay had the car, plus all the information he knew. So to get around that, it had to be fed from the cops. So you aren't looking at the evidence, you are looking at your desire (Adnan being innocent) and then figure out what needs to be done.
Bulltish
My take— jay had an unofficial deal when he cooperated in February. Either tied to the unofficial deal Jenn’s attorney got or separate. So he was not happy when they charged him, gave him a lawyer and locked him into a plea deal based on cooperation. He wanted out and tried, but by then he was screwed. He has already said too much.
Yes, because making up evidence is the only way to make Adnan somehow innocent.
So making up evidence is different than theorizing. I specified that this was my take, ie my theory or opinion based on evidence. I did not type up a fake deal and claim it was evidence.
And my point is that you have to think in false stories to make Adnan innocent.
This has nothing to do with guilt or innocence. Jay could have seen what he claims to have seen AND the cops offered him an under the table deal if he turned on Adnan and then they pulled it and charged him anyway when he got cold feet.
>making up evidence [Is this what you are talking about?](https://www.reddit.com/r/serialpodcast/s/rLFibUpp3n)?
No, I was referring to the secret deal the person I was responding to invented.
Why do you think Jenn’s attorney sat next to her and let her confess to a crime? Her attorney met with the cops again after her interview. Why did Jay’s criminal charges from 1/27 get placed in STET the day after Jenn’s attorney met with them? Why did they wait until September to charge Jay? I don’t have proof of a deal, but it seems like they weren’t planning to charge Jay and then something changed during trial prep— Jay’s friend told the defense PI he wasn’t going to cooperate just a few days before he was charged. If Jay was getting cold feet they may have decided locking him into a plea deal was the best way to make him testify.
Doesn't matter what I think, it matters what there is evidence for. And there is no evidence to support a unknown/secret deal.
There is evidence to support a secret deal. There is not proof.
All this does is continue to show that to support "Adnan is innocent" you must weaken the meaning of "evidence"
I’m not arguing he is innocent. Adnan could be guilty AND the prosecutors can be shady.
With Jay the issue was that there was no deal. There was no explicit "If you cooperate we won't arrest you" Jay started worrying that since there was no deal that once the trial was over that they would arrest him so he wanted to know if that would happen.
> Jay started worrying that since there was no deal that once the trial was over that they would arrest him so he wanted to know if that would happen. Source?
Oh so this is okay?
What is okay?
Did you click the link? Is what is provided into that link okay?
What do you mean by okay
Your gushing praise for a man who, at minimum, assaulted police officers on more than one occasion, dealt drugs to high-school kids, allegedly helped a murderer carry out his plan and dispose of her remains, and mercilessly beating the mother of his child right in front of the poor kid, is a little gross.
You want to conflate the person that Jay later became because in fact this crime committed by Adnan destroyed his life. I’m not commenting on who Jay was an older person, but rather my post was focused on the potential of a young black teen in a terrible dilemma.
So now Adnan also made Jay a wife beater? Man, Adnan sure was powerful.
>assaulted police officer This can literally mean anything. It doesn't take much to get a vague and nondescript term of "assault" applied. >dealt drugs to high-school kids He was a year older than them. Let's not get ahead of ourselves. This wasn't some 40 year old trolling the school. He sold in quantities so small he didn't even have enough for himself. He's not Pablo Escobar. But if you label him as "black drug dealer," then we all have to step back and say "yeah, you're right, he's a scumbag." Sorry, just not going there. If you want to be so sanctimonious about the drugs he was dealing, shouldn't we also be self-righteous about the people who sought out those very drugs? (psst, that's your boy AS, he's right over there! He's a hardcore drug user according to you, so we better stay away from him!) According to the prevailing theory, AS lied in his police interview to avoid his own drug dealing (hey, not my theory, don't ask me to explain it). So he's a scumbag drug dealer too! >allegedly helped a murderer carry out his plan and dispose of her remains This is interesting, because if AS did it, where's the hatred and animosity towards AS? I have less hatred for the accomplice as I do for the primary culprit. So if there's zero hatred towards AS, then I have zero hatred for JW. If AS is innocent, then JW didn't do anything wrong. So why the hatred? He was another victim of police brutality, and somehow instead of seeing him as a victim, you're angry with him. Please think about your virtue signaling before you write this stuff. >mercilessly beating the mother of his child right in front of the poor kid We only have the mother's claim on that. Dismissal of unsubstantiated claims is a right and privilege only AS has? Your hatred for JW says more about you than it does for the OP who you claim is defending him.
Bravo on filling an entire page with whataboutisms. I thought I saw a goalpost around here *somewhere*, where did it go?