This American Life - Serial

[MrDirt]

At the recommendation of a couple others, I finally got enough downtime at work (where downtime equals sitting in a pickup truck for 12 straight hours bored to tears) to catch up on the twelve episode podcast series of This American LIfe - Serial. It was broadcasted weekly and just finished up last week, but I hadn't been following and just binged the whole thing in one sitting. Only two people I knew were talking about it, but I'm still surprised not to see a discussion here given its supposed popularity.

If you haven't heard about it, I highly recommend it. Gripped the whole time.

http://serialpodcast.org/

Background: The story (completely real-life and on-going) revolves around the murder of a high school senior, by her boyfriend in the Baltimore suburbs in 1999. The boyfriend was convicted of 1st degree murder and is currently serving a life sentence, but maintains his complete innocence. The case, however, is full of holes, twists, and inconsistencies - the likes of which will have you convinced every 5 minutes of a different level of guilt or innocence. Give it a shot, should make for some interesting discussion here.

[patxi]

Thanks for the tip. I have a 15 hour drive coming up later this week and it sounds like a good way to pass the time. Anybody got some other suggestions for something similar?

[Chugach001]

Bump. Well worth the listen

[creaky fossil]

Q for those who have tuned in AND have watched either of David Simon's creations The Wire and/or Homicide --

did you find your knowledge of Simon's TV shows made you feel like you knew Baltimore better and thus were better informed for guessing whether Syed is innocent?

[Platinum Pete]

Q for those who have tuned in AND have watched either of David Simon's creations The Wire and/or Homicide --

did you find your knowledge of Simon's TV shows made you feel like you knew Baltimore better and thus were better informed for guessing whether Syed is innocent?

I've watched every second of The Wire at least twice and I didn't think it applied much to Serial. What are you connecting between the two?

[Chugach001]

I watched the Wire and was most reminded of it when they talked about jury selection and the candidates were asked; "have any of you ever been convicted of a crime or victim of a crime, within your immediate family" and half raised their hand. Otherwise, the picture in my mind was always more suburban. This was in part due to the multi-ethnic nature of the kids in the gifted high school program - not similar to The Wire where they were pretty much all one race and low-end losers.

[creaky fossil]

Woodlawn HS is suburbia-ish in a gross generalization way, but it's not exactly Baltimore's beverly hills. Leakin Park is a known body dump that was mentioned in The Wire. The well-off in B-more tend to go to one of the many private schools throughout the city and the near-sitting suburbs. I think Baltimore may have the greatest number of private schools per capita of any place I have lived or lived near. I don't think Woodlawn ranks as one of the best HS facilities in the city, though Serial may glamorize it as such, and its faculty and administrators may tout it as such.

Does Serial portray police as hair-trigger, conviction-happy and willing to ignore evidence where a fast-track conviction is in issue? I wonder because most of the cop shows I've watched on Netflix that were made in the past 5 yrs or so have been eager to make heroes of the police, rather than dare to show them as corrupt.

[MrDirt]

Woodlawn isn't portrayed as anything upper echelon, but as a predominantly black school in a neighborhood where people move to escape the city.

Serial is actually pretty balanced in my opinion. There are a lot of facts that would have you believing that the cops/prosecutors are exactly as you describe, then some expert opinion that their performance in the case was actually fairly above average.

My opinion after two full runs through the podcast is that the police ARE conviction hungry as you describe, but that's their job and news to no one with half a brain. The real unfairness in the trial seems to come from Adnan's lawyer who had access to all the same information and potential witnesses and evidence, yet chose not to dig through any of what may have easily torn through the prosecutions weak case.

The appeal that is in the works as we speak is seeking to bring some of that potential evidence back into play. I will be extremely interested in hearing what happens over the next few weeks. It's easy to become very quickly invested in this story.

[Atrain505]

Great listen and well worth the time. The main take away from it...the legal system is scary. Innocent until proven guilty does not exist in this case and many, many others. I already knew that, but this really drove it home. Makes you feel like if you happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time the world could come crashing down, even if you did absolutely nothing.
He very well could be guilty, but he very well could be innocent...and I just can't fundamentally wrap my head around throwing the book at somebody when there is no certain proof.

[MrDirt]

For those that have listened to the whole thing, I'm sure you've read articles and possibly scanned reddit, but have any of you read any of the actual transcripts? It definitely swayed my opinions a little further to one side, especially after I discovered this woman's blog.

http://viewfromll2.com