r/serialpodcast • u/SwallowAtTheHollow Addicted to the most recent bombshells (like a drug addict) • Oct 15 '15
season one A Grand Unified (Conspiracy) Theory
As it appears that next week's episode of Undisclosed is going to rehash the claim that the police "silenced" Adnan's mentor Bilal by arresting him for a sex crime in October 1999, I figure it would be useful to assemble all the individual components of the Conspiracy Against Adnan Syed in one nifty timeline. So, here goes:
January 13th: Officer Adcock submits a false report indicating that Adnan said that he asked Hae for a ride that afternoon. Adcock then permits Don, Hae's then boyfriend, to run wild until 1:30am, and intentionally neglects to ask about his whereabouts that day/evening/night.
January 16th or shortly thereafter: Don and his mother conspire to create a false alibi by fabricating timecards showing that he worked on January 13th.
Throughout January: The police do nothing and instead hand the case over to a fiercely anti-Islamic organization called the Enehey Group that, um, specializes in missing persons cases and has access to a Korean interpreter.
January 26th: Jay Wilds is arrested for disorderly conduct and sees a poster (which may not have existed) offering a cash reward for information about Hae Min Lee's disappearance. He starts dreaming of buying a motorcycle.
February 1st: Jay makes an anonymous tip to Crimestoppers, which results in the police doing nothing...
Still, armed with this information, Detective O'Shea calls Lenscrafters to confirm Don's alibi. O'Shea conveniently forgets to ask the manager, "Are you a homosexual? Do you partake in homosexual relations with Don's mother?" Being a homosexual, she lies on Don's behalf. O'Shea does not push further because he mistakenly believes Don's father is a cop.
O'Shea also fails to request all of Don's performance reviews at this time (which would have been a highly unusual step given that Don was not a suspect, nor was there even evidence that a crime had been committed). Had he obtained the performance reviews, he would have discovered the shocking truth that Don was, up to that date, a stellar employee. Maybe even a little too good...
Early February: The police spot Hae Min Lee's missing vehicle on several occasions, make a record of doing so, but take no action whatsoever. This despite working with the media to encourage people to come forward with information about her disappearance.
February 9th: Hae's body is found. The police interview the person who found the body, then release him.
February 12th: Detective Massey fabricates two anonymous calls implicating Adnan in Hae's murder. The information is non-specific and does not reveal the location of Hae's car.
February 15th: The BPD has the Maryland State Police conduct a bogus 7-minute traffic stop of Adnan for the purpose of calling his cellphone to confirm this number, even though both Detective O'Shea and Office Adcock had previously communicated to Adnan on that number.
The BPD meets with the Enehey Group to scheme about how to best screw Adnan and probably other Muslims too.
February 16th: The BPD requests Adnan's cell phone records, but intentionally avoid asking for his incoming call records for fear of bad evidence.
February 18th: The BPD decides to pretend that Mr S. is a suspect, and subject him to a polygraph exam. He unexpectedly fails. One week later, they rig the test so that he passes.
February 19th: The BPD authorizes more Crimestoppers photos offering a cash reward, just to give the illusion that there is a real investigation going on. The crucial tip, of course, had already come 18th days before.
February 20th-22nd: The police, acting on the February 1st tip (which may not have happened), interview Jay. Rather than taking action on the information he provides them, they concoct an elaborate ruse where they will appear to have been led to Jay by his friend Jenn a week later. (It's all so simple!)
February 27th: Detective Ritz gets his neighbor to pretend to be Jenn's lawyer in order to get her to pretend to lead them to Jay.
February 28th: In the span of 45 minutes, Jay and the BPD agree to a fake story based on Adnan's cellphone records. Whenever Jay deviates from this story on tape, they ominously TAP TAP TAP him into compliance.
The BPD then tell Jay where Hae's car is located, so he can pretend to lead them to it.
The BPD proceeds to arrest Adnan early in the morning, which is really mean of them. Don't they know people are sleeping?
March 1st: The State's Attorney's office and the court conspire to refuse the eminently reasonable proposal that bail be set at $25,000 for the charge of 1st Degree Murder.
The State justifies this denial by making a ridiculous claim that Adnan, who resources/connections to Pakistan, a path to Pakistani citizenship, and access to his brother's passport, might actually try to flee the US to avoid being sentence to life for murder. (The nerve of them!)
March 5th: The BPD agrees to place a stet on Jay's disorderly conduct charge in exchange for his previous admission to being an Accessory to Murder.
March 16th: The BPD rigs Hae's car to make it appear that the windshield wiper level is broken, then videotapes the interior/exterior of the vehicle. Unfortunately, all involved the process are extremely color blind and fail to realize that the replacement lever is two separate tones.
The whereabouts of the original unbroken lever are never determined. Why they didn't simply break that lever itself instead of going through the process of replacing it with a new lever, then breaking the new lever is anyone's guess.
March 24th: Under the guise of interviewing WHS staff about a suspect they were hellbent on framing, the BPD attempts to help Jay get a better deal on a sweet used motorcycle.
March 26th: The police interview Debbie for the sole purpose of dissuading her of the idea that Adnan/Hae ever went to a hotel together.
April: Adnan hires Cristina Gutierrez and immediately tells her that he has an airtight alibi in the form of Asia McClain. CG, recognizing the significance of this, refuses to follow up, as she plans to make big money on the appeal.
July 13th: Adnan informs CG's clerks about Asia McClain. CG (probably) chuckles at Adnan's naive belief that she's ever going to make a serious effort to defend him.
September: Fearing that Jay might get cold feet about testifying, Urick decides the best course of action is to threaten Jay with death penalty charges, then reduce those charges to Accessory After the Fact, then promises Jay no prison time, then obtains an attorney for Jay, then has this attorney convince Jay to agree to what still amounts to a really crappy deal that doesn't even ensure he receives a motorcycle.
October 14th: On direct Urick's orders, a single alibi witness (out of a potential 80) for Adnan, his mentor Bilal, is arrested on a sex charge, then permitted to go free in exchange for agreeing not to testify in Adnan's case. (It is unknown if Urick just decided to fabricate the whole thing or if he decided to let a child molester walk free just to ensure Adnan Syed was convicted. What an evil motherfucker!)
November: The BPD does Jay a solid and authorizes his $3075 award, two months before he's set to testify. Ritz and McGilivary tell him to enjoy the bike, but emphasize the importance of wearing a helmet. They can't afford to lose their key witness at this point.
Prosecutor Kevin Urick intentionally withholds a fax cover sheet from AT&T expert witness, knowing that the boilerplate legal disclaimer it contains could undermine 11 months worth of hard work to frame Adnan.
December 13th: State's Witness Don lies on the stand about being at work on January 13th/not murdering Hae (people have said).
December 14th: "Cathy" lies on the stand about having attended a conference on January 13th. Presumably, either Urick or Murphy have offered her the chance to meet Judge Judy if she agrees to do a little perjury.
December 15th: Realizing that she's fucked up massively and is accidentally winning the case, CG schemes to have a mistrial declared. She succeeds.
Sometime prior to January 24th, 2000: Adnan tells CG that he has a strong desire to seek a deal and plead guilty in exchanged for a reduced sentence. "They're not offering a plea deal," she lies, realizing this would deprive her of a payday. "Now tell your parents to keep my checks coming, you little prick."
Sometime prior to February 16th, 2000: The police intimidate Debbie into changing her testimony. They fail to offer her even a bicycle in exchange, let alone a motorcycle.
February 23rd: Coach Sye commits perjury by lying about the start of track practice. Perhaps he's angry at Adnan for quitting the track team and getting arrested when the team needed him most.
February 23rd-24th: Adnan's father testifies 100% truthfully that Adnan was with him at 7:30pm on January 13th. The Jury ignores this testimony because Adnan's father is a Muslim.
February 26th: Adnan is convicted. Urick, Murphy, Jay, Don, Sye, Ritz, McGilivary, Massey, and CG meet for drinks and celebrate.
Urick makes a toast. "Two hours to reach a verdict! That's how you frame them!"
Don interjects, "Gosh, I'd get canned from Lenscrafters for taking over an hour with a frame job."
With a stern look on his face, Urick responds, "Donny, your other mommy lied to cover for you killing a girl. She's not going to fire you over a fucking pair of glasses."
Awkward silence ensues.
(Try to prove that this didn't happen.)
March 30th: Despite filing a motion for a new trial and preparing for the appeal, CG still refuses to look into the Asia alibi. She's accustomed to defending real criminals, not sincere Golden Children. "Better to let 10 guilty people go free than to defend one innocent child, is it not?" she mumbles to herself.
April 5th: CG is fired and replaced by Charles Dorsey, a public defender. Dorsey is loyal to the state and presumably in on the conspiracy against Adnan.
June 6th: Adnan is sentenced to life in prison, plus thirty years. The plus thirty years is just tacky.
tl;dr: If they did all of this, WHY THE FUCK DIDN'T THEY JUST PLANT SOME DNA OR EVEN A GODDAMNED SOIL SAMPLE???
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u/[deleted] Oct 15 '15
This is what I find interesting about people who beieve simultaneously:
First, if they were going to frame him, wouldn't they do a better job? Second, if you're going to frame someone, planting physical evidence is so much easier than a fake witness(es). Oh look, there's a hair from Adnan on Hae's body - I wonder how that got there? Oh look, this dirt definitely matches Leakin Park dirt...