Serial - Not a Grand Theory, But a Mini-Theory

Today marked the debut of the 12^th and final episode of Season 1 of Serial, the podcast to end all podcasts. The podcast to begin all podcasts?

 

Okay, honestly, I found this to be a thoroughly enjoyable true crime podcast but probably not even my favorite of all the podcasts I’m currently listening to, and I know there are so many out there I haven’t even experienced. I have been enjoying Planet Money, This American Life (which gave birth to Serial), and The Broad Experience (why, why are you not listening to this podcast?!) for many moons and I shall go on enjoying these whether or not Serial makes it to Season 2, though it now seems certain that it will

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But getting back to Baltimore 1999, I will put forward my grand theory about what really happened that January day, based on my own review of the evidence, the things that jived for me, and the things that didn’t.

First, I don’t believe Adnan did it. It just doesn’t sound, from Hae’s journal, his recollection, the recollections of his friends, and Don’s narrative, like he was fixated on her enough to kill her.

As for other motives, I don’t buy the whole “you don’t know the real Adnan”/psychopath thing either. As most of the experts mentioned, most murders are mundane. Adnan displays a lot of qualities that do not go hand-in-hand with psychopathy (Snakes in Suits and Jon Ronson’s The Psychopath Test are fun reads on psychopathy, and This American Life has a podcast on it if Serial has only just now opened your eyes to the wonder that is podcasts). What other reason would he have had?

So, who killed Hae? I have no idea. If Serial doesn’t answer this question, I am comfortable enough not answering it either. The Innocence Project is on the case! Which, by the way, is a great way of giving us a non-ending but still providing the hope of closure down the road. Nice work, Koenig.

So my theory is not so much a grand theory as a mini-theory. It doesn’t take on the murder, but it does explain a lot of the peripheral things that stuck out at me throughout as unexplained throughout the 12 episodes, and it connects all these dots in one.simple.sentence [which Millie informs me has already been scooped on Reddit]

I’ll get to that. But first, let me touch on the loose threads which have bugged me throughout the arch of Season 1. These were all issues the producers raised, though some were pressed and prodded more than others.

1. Everyone, including Adnan and Jay, said they weren't that good of friends back then. They were kind of pot-buddies, but not close and did not know much about each other. It is weird that if Adnan really had killed hae that Jay would be who he would call for help and even weirder that Jay would actually come help him bury the body.
2. Jay's story to friends at the time did indicate that something happened, and that he had some part in it, at least in the cleanup. The details from Stephanie and this latest guy interviewed (Josh?) about him acting very anxious in the days after Hae’s murder ring true. But everything Jay actually says has to be taken with a grain of salt. His story changed numerous times and everyone said he was known to lie constantly (though normally about little things, but not big things). The various versions of his story, and the changes, including the vivid description of the 4:30 visit to watch the sunset at the park that later he drops completely, and which could not have happened if Adnan was at track practice, each leave some detail hanging loose out there begging for explanation.
3. Adnan's attitude in prison has puzzled everyone. Sure, okay, he's "adaptable" as Sarah Koenig has said, but when she really pressed him on why, if he was innocent, he wasn't more angry; at Jay, at his defense lawyer, at the system, for his conviction,  the answer he came up with was that he thought if he'd been a better Muslim, this wouldn't have happened to him. I interpreted that at the time as he would not have been a suspect if he hadn't been the "ex-boyfriend," which he wouldn't have been if he'd been volunteering at the mosque instead of sneaking around dating a girl against his parents' wishes. People who think he is guilty probably thought this odd statement was a confession of sorts. Nonetheless it stuck out because surely it doesn't answer Koenig's question.
4. The final weird missing bit came in this last episode where they realize that the cell phone logs show that neither Adnan nor Jay has told the truth about where they were that morning, but they for sure weren't at the mall buying Stephanie a birthday present.  One of the tower pings is near another drug-related location, but both of them have admitted using and buying drugs, so there’d be no reason to lie about this if that is where they were that day.

The theory that I think most reasonably addresses all these points is that maybe Adnan and Jay had a physical relationship back in '99. That's it. That's the entire extent of the theory.

I'm not saying they were necessarily secretly dating, or that either of them is necessarily gay, but just that there might have been a messing around component to those weed-smoking sessions. Adnan can't talk about it because of his religion, Jay because of social/psychological influences of his race/class/conceptions of masculinity.

I am not saying it has anything to do with the murder. Perhaps neither of them did it, perhaps either of them did, perhaps this serial killer did but they (or one of them) found the body, freaked, and buried her. No idea about the murder.

But if Adnan and Jay did have a physical relationship, and were together the morning of the 13th, or at some point during that day, this would explain why neither of them has ever given a thoroughly 100% honest answer about the events of that day, the timeline, and where the events took place.

It also explains Adnan's attitude now, like he brought all of this on himself, as God's just punishment. If he were a better Muslim back then, he would be able to explain where he was that day but if he were in the Best Buy parking lot...where there were no security cameras...with Jay...then that explains why he can’t talk about it.

Of course, for Jay to be the state's witness as he was, we might think there had to be some falling out between them, but it still didn't necessarily have to have anything to do with the murder. He could have thought Adnan did it (when really someone else did), hid the body and the car. He could have been jealous and blaming Adnan could be his revenge. He could have been jealous and killed Hae. Anything is possible. 

On the other hand, perhaps there was no falling out between them at all. There were those long hours of questioning with the cops before they turned the tape on in Jay’s interviews. Who knows what pressures were brought to bear in those unrecorded hours.

I am neither a Muslim child of Pakistani immigrant parents, nor an African-American Baltimore teenage boy. But I was a high school senior in 1999. It doesn’t seem so long ago, but the world has evolved a lot since then. In some places (socially and geographically), gay relationships were totally fine, but in a lot of places, it was still very much not okay.  But would a 17 year old choose to go to prison - would an 18 year old send an innocent person to prison - rather than admit to a physical relationship with another guy? Of all the lies, the unexplained, the unbelievable raised in Adnan’s case, this I could believe.