Crime Weekly - S2 Ep95: Hae Min Lee & Adnan Syed: Let's Start From The Beginning (Part 1)

Episode Date: October 14, 2022

It was an unseasonably warm January afternoon in Baltimore County, Maryland when 18-year-old Woodlawn High School senior Hae Min Lee left school in her gray 1998 Nissan Sentra and headed out to pick up her six-year-old cousin from kindergarten before going to her job at the local LensCrafters. But sometime after leaving Woodlawn High School and before picking up her little cousin, Hae Min Lee vanished into thin air. Less than a month later, maintenance worker Alonzo Sellers was driving back to his job at Coppin State College and drinking a beer when he realized he had to use the bathroom, and it couldn’t wait. Mr. Sellers pulled over on the side of the road and walked deep into the woods to relieve himself, at which point he made a gruesome discovery. According to his later testimony, Mr. Sellers said quote, “when I looked down I seen something that looked like hair, something that was covered by dirt. And I looked real good again, and that’s when I seen what looked like a foot” end quote. Alonzo Sellers had stumbled upon the body of Hae Min Lee, she had been strangled to death by the bare hands of her attacker, and within a few weeks, the police would make an arrest for her murder. But, the suspect was a person that no one would have suspected capable of such a horrific crime, the ex-boyfriend of Hae, a sweet and smart 17-year-old named Adnan Syed. But, stay with us, because, it’s complicated… Try our coffee!! - www.CriminalCoffeeCo.com Become a Patreon member -- > https://www.patreon.com/CrimeWeekly Shop for your Crime Weekly gear here --> https://crimeweeklypodcast.com/shop Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CrimeWeeklyPodcast Website: CrimeWeeklyPodcast.com Instagram: @CrimeWeeklyPod Twitter: @CrimeWeeklyPod Facebook: @CrimeWeeklyPod Ads: Go to https://Surfshark.deals/crimeweekly and use code crimeweekly to get 83% off a 2 year plan plus 3 extra months for free! Helix is offering up to 200 dollars off all mattress orders AND two free pillows for our listeners! Go helixsleep.com/crimeweekly. With Helix, better sleep starts now. Go to dailyharvest.com/crimeweekly to get up to $40 off your first box! Switch to Amazon Pharmacy and save time, save money and stay healthy. Learn more at Amazon.com/crimeweekly

It was an unseasonably warm January afternoon in Baltimore County, Maryland, when an 18-year-old Woodlawn High School senior, Hye Min Lee, left school in her gray 1998 Nissan Sentra and headed out to pick up her six-year-old cousin from kindergarten before going to her job at the local LensCrafters. But sometime after leaving Woodlawn High School and before picking up her little cousin, Hye Min Lee vanished into thin air. Less than a month later, maintenance worker Alonzo Sellers was driving back to his job at Copen State College and drinking a beer when he realized he had to use the bathroom, and it couldn't wait. Mr. Sellers pulled over on the side of the road and walked deep into the woods to relieve himself, at which point he made a gruesome discovery. According to his later testimony, Mr. Sellers said, quote,

When I looked down, I seen something that looked like hair, something that was covered by dirt, and I looked real good again, and that's when I seen what looked like a foot, end quote. Alonzo Sellers had stumbled upon the body of Hye Min Lee. She had been strangled to death by the hands of her attacker, and within a few weeks, the police would make an arrest for her murder. But the suspect was a person that no one would have suspected capable of such a horrific crime, the ex-boyfriend of Hye, a sweet and smart 17-year-old named Adnan Saeed. But stay with us, because it's complicated.

Hello, everybody. Welcome back to Crime Weekly. I'm Stephanie Harlow. And I'm Derek Levasseur. So Heyman Lee and Adnan Saeed have become household names. They've been the focus of multiple true crime podcasts and shows. They've been the focus of SNL skits, even though that was a weird take, water cooler discussions and message board arguments. However, the one podcast that launched this true crime case into the public view was Serial, where investigative reporter Sarah Koenig broke down her year-long investigation into the 1999 murder of Hye Min Lee, and she broke it down into weekly episodes, launched in 2014, and it then captured the attention of millions. In a time when a podcast was considered successful, if it reached thousands, Serial was getting an average of 2.2 million listens each episode. And I do think that before that, there was a lot of people who were into true crime. I was one of them. but serial really made true crime the very popular genre that it is

today. I really do believe that because it's right around the time where the YouTube channel started popping up and podcasting became very much a true crime dominated sort of industry. Yeah. I remember when it first came out, I've always told you guys i'm not a big podcast listener I never have been And it's it's one of those things where people like how could you not be? Well, it's like if you Are a plumber you're probably not going to go home and listen to a plumbing podcast It's just you want to separate yourself, especially with true crime when you're doing it

It's a very it's tough on the on your brain and your mental health So you try to stay away from it when you're off work. So that's kind of why I never really listened to any podcast, not just serial. But there was no way to escape it. We were talking about it at work, talking about it with my friends and family because I was law enforcement. So it was something that was, even for just the mainstream people who weren't necessarily into true crime, everybody was talking about it. There was even teachers at high schools and colleges who were making courses based around Serial. It was crazy.

It was a phenomenon that I don't think has really died down yet. And Serial was the one that kind of pushed everything forward. But when it released in 2014, Adnan Saeed had already been behind bars for 14 years after a jury found him guilty of Hay's murder. But the podcast caused many to question whether or not that was where he belonged. And it kickstarted a cry for justice, both for Hayman Lee and for Adnan Saeed, which came to a head this year, 2022, when a judge vacated the murder conviction of Adnan Saeed, who went to prison when he was 18 years old and was released when he was 41. Now, you might think that everyone is on the same page, especially once they listened to the serial investigation, and it's cut and dry that Adnan should never have been charged with this

murder or that he didn't do it at all. But in fact, public opinion is much more split than I had originally thought, which I can totally understand because this is one of those cases that I personally can't decide on either. I've gone back and forth for years. information, so many changing stories that it previously felt impossible to lay it all out in a format that's organized and clear, which is why I've never covered it on YouTube, although it's been heavily requested. I just really didn't know how. But with these new developments, Derek was like, hey, can we do it? You know, I would like to figure this out for myself. I want to see what's going on with it. And I feel like with his help and insight, now is the time. And after thinking about the format and spending way too much time thinking about the format, I finally decided the best way to do it is in true Crime Weekly fashion, starting from

the beginning, going through the timelines, tracking the stories as they change and evolve, and at the end, seeing if we can make some sense of it all together. But I do want to throw out some disclaimers and personal observations. To put this series together, I've used information from the Serial podcast as well as from the Undisclosed podcast. And I do want to point out that the latter is going to have some biases. The Undisclosed podcast consists of three attorneys who investigate wrongful convictions, as well as the United States criminal justice system in general. And the podcast started in April of 2015 with an examination of the state of Maryland's case against Adnan Saeed. However, one of the attorneys on the podcast is Rabia Chaudhry, who's actually a close friend of Adnan and his family.

And she's been fighting for justice for Adnan since the beginning. And I personally love Rabia. I met her at CrimeCon in New Orleans. I even have a picture of us together because I was so pumped. It was my first CrimeCon and I was so excited to meet her. I think she's a badass. She's a smart and strong woman. She's great.

But I do want to put everything out there just so you know where the information is coming from and why it might be slanted a certain way when it comes from a certain direction. Rabia also wrote a book that I've used. And then, of course, I would go into all the police files and the case documents and sort of double check things. And that is the great thing about the Undisclosed podcast. They do have tons of case documents posted on their website, which are going to be extremely helpful on our journey to clarity through these next episodes. So for me, knowing the general overview of this case, this story, like I said,

I've heard about it before. Then we just had the charge that was recently vacated. Everybody's talking about it. And what was interesting to me charge that was recently vacated. Everybody's talking about it. And what was interesting to me is as I was looking on Twitter and just kind of like general sites, true crime sites that I now kind of keep up on because of our own channel, I was surprised to see that it was more split than I thought. I thought it was kind of like the general consensus. Like everyone knew this guy was innocent and this was just such an egregious thing that took place and everyone was happy about this. But as I look deeper and not even that deep, just sometimes on Twitter from, you know, the blue check mark accounts, people are

like, this guy did it. I had not did it. And so the categories that I put it into is you have the people who feel like he's innocent and he should have never been charged in the first place. Then you have people who say he's guilty. He should still be in prison. And then you have another group of people who say he's guilty, but the way they got to that point was wrong. And we can't allow that type of practice to take place because it gives too much leverage. It gives too much leeway for law enforcement where they're, they can't prove it. So they're going to find ways to get the answers they need to get the conviction. And even if he's guilty, we don't want to make that a common practice because there will be times where the cop is certain that they got their guy, but they're wrong. And someone ends up going to prison for something they didn't do. And you

don't want that. And by the way, we can get right to that. I agree a hundred percent. The saying, I always say, rather see a thousand guilty men go free than one innocent man go to jail for a crime he didn't commit. Stand by that. So as I'm reading these things, I'm saying, I kind of want to look into it. I want to read about it more. I kind of want to listen to the podcast serial now. And I'm like, why would I do that when I can just have the best podcast right here? I can have the best researcher right here, break it down for me. We can go over it together and literally do it on camera. So it's killing two birds with one stone. And you guys know, I'll call it how I see it. I know some people are really passionate about this case. If I think he's guilty, I'm going to say he's guilty,

period. You guys already know that. So we'll see how it goes. I know it's going to be long. We got to start from the beginning because I don't know the specifics. So there's going to be some of you out there who may think you already know everything. And this could be something that you're hearing things you've already heard. But I also think there's a lot of people who haven't heard these details. So if we want to make an informed opinion together, you have to have all the facts. And that's why, like Stephanie said, we got to start from the beginning. Yeah. So I think that I haven't been on like social media to see the reaction. But I when I was researching for this case and I mean, like I told you earlier, before we started recording, this has been the third time I've listened to the serial podcast through from start to beginning. And the second time I've listened to the undisclosed coverage of this case from the start to the beginning because they've just re-released new stuff.

They didn't like how they did it initially, so they've re-released better stuff, and I've been really enjoying it. But when I was looking through Reddit and stuff, I was like, oh, damn, a lot of people think he did this. I was under the impression once Serial came out and everybody was talking about it, it was like, oh, we got to get him free. And then all of a sudden, as soon as he goes free, people are like, hmm, I don't know if this should be what happened. And I don't know if they're the same people who were shouting for his freedom when he was in there, but it seems it's a little confusing to me. So we'll see. We'll see how we feel about it. I don't even tell you this shit, but when the charge was vacated, I talked to a big producer in the industry and he was like what's he's like derek what's your thoughts on it and i said i don't really know i haven't really looked into it and he goes it's interesting

because love would love to do something on tv or on netflix or something like that like streaming ways and i know they've done some things but he's like part of me believes he did it and i don't want to go this direction and come to find out he did do it where we're making him look like this innocent party when he's a murderer. So I was like, yeah, I mean, that is a, that is a conundrum. That is a problem. So that's why some people in television have stayed away from it. Cause they're like, just looking at the facts on the surface, you know, if you take the witnesses at what they said at face value, maybe he did do it.

So I'm really wondering where I'm going to fall at the end of this one, because I'm going into it with a complete open mind. In fact, I'm going into it under the impression he's innocent, to be fair. I'm just going to go from that angle and see what happens as you start to lay things out. If that changes my mind, I'm going into it thinking they got it right. The charge has been vacated. Let's see where it falls. Well, I'm not here to change your mind. I'm just here to lay it all out because I don't even have my mindset. And that's a new one for me. I like to go into these things with my mindset. And I think that's another reason why I've never covered

it because I don't know. And I don't want to be like, yeah, non, get out. We got to get him free if he actually did it. It was so confusing and convoluted for me. Okay, without further ado, let's get started. Hye Min Lee was born in South Korea on October 15, 1980, and she traveled to the United States with her mother, Yoon Kim, and her younger brother, Young Lee, in 1992 to live with her mother, brother, grandparents, and two cousins. And it's been reported that her father didn't believe leaving South Korea was the right thing to do, so he remained behind and did not immigrate with the rest of the family. She lived in Baltimore County, Maryland, and she attended Woodlawn High School, where she was very high achieving in academics

and very active in sports. Hay was on the wrestling team, and she played field hockey, but according to fellow students, she was an artist on the lacrosse field. One of Hay's lacrosse teammates, Catherine, said, quote, God, she was beautiful on the field. She was just beautiful. Watching her flit between defenders was watching a pure expression of grace and speed. We all bobbed and weaved, but she danced. She made every play look like it was choreographed. I would say she loved lacrosse, but it would be just as true to say she loved everything. She loved life and explored everything with the same verve, and she was hell-bent on bringing you along for the ride. I can't even

really remember what she looks like without a huge grin on her face. End quote. Ralph Graham, Woodlawn High School's athletic director, echoed Catherine's sentiments, saying there were no words to describe Hayes' smile, and he fondly remembered that the tiny girl would often burst into spontaneous and off-key singing. She told jokes all the time, and although some of them weren't especially funny, her enthusiasm for telling them would crack everyone up. And for some bizarre reason, she was a big fan of the Teletubbies television show. But Hayman Lee could and would get serious when she needed to. Her mother had sacrificed and lost a lot in order to bring her to a country where she

could access better education. Hay was a leader in athletics. She was dedicated. She played hard, and she wanted everyone else to take it seriously as well. She was an honors student, one of only five who were traveling to France with the school the following summer. After school, Hay was kept busy as well. She was a member of the Ecology Club, the French Club, and Students Against Destructive Decisions. She worked at LensCrafters after school, not only because she needed extra money, but because one day she wanted to become an optician. Every move for Hay, every decision, had a long-term purpose, except for one decision. One decision that she made that didn't seem to be thought out

or to be a stepping stone to future success. And that was, to date, Adnan Saeed. Like Hay, Adnan was also smart and motivated. In fact, they were both part of Woodland High School's magnet program. According to the school's website, quote, the early college program provides students with a college preparatory program that combines high school and college in a supportive yet rigorous educational environment. End quote. This program is something you have to apply for and have the grades for. And in the winter of 1999, when Hay was murdered, there were only about 25 students in the magnet program. And because these students took all of their classes, besides gym and art, together in a different part of the building than the other students, they all became very close friends, almost like family. So it does make sense that within this program and within this handful of students who hung out together inside and outside of school, some romantic relationships would be created. It's the reason that reality

television producers put people in a house together and then film what happens because something's going to happen. I mean, you should know that, right? I was about to say, I have no clue what you're talking about. Completely foreign. That must be an absolute train wreck. Yeah, right. If you think about it, 25 kids, the same 25 kids going to all their classes together, always together, literally separated and isolated from the other students in a different part of the building. Yeah, they're going to get really close to each other in more ways than one. And some of the other students would say like the magnet kids thought that they were better than everyone else,

so they had this shared sort of superior feeling to the other kids. I could see that. And sometimes that's just their own insecurities too, right? I remember we had like the honors program. I was not part of it where you had the kids who were like, believe it or not, when I was a kid, they called it the gifted program. I'm sure they got rid of that name because that really was probably not the best name to differentiate the kids. Makes it feel like they're X-Men, right? The gifted program. I just thought about that now. I'm like, wow, that was really not a good choice.

But I was not in the gifted program. And there were times where I'd be like, oh, they just think they're better than us, you know? Even though they said absolutely nothing or did anything to reflect that. I just, that was just where my head went. Oh, so you mean the students who are saying that the magnet kids thought they were superior? It's those students insecurities, not the students. Yeah, that was me. That's what I'm saying. I only know that from personal experience because that was me. I'm like, oh, you think you're gifted? You're like these stuck up geniuses. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, there was definitely a lot of people who kind of came out after Adnan got arrested and they were like, oh, he always thought he was better than us. But even, you know, and this could just be because he was supposed to be the attacker and Hay was supposed to be, you know, the victim or was the victim. But most people were like, Hay never acted better than anybody. She was very friendly. She was always nice. But, yeah, there was some people that thought you know Adnan was kind of like hoarding it over them or lording it over them you know I'm glad you said that it's a little off the beaten path but I'm glad you just said what you said that Hayes the victim here because

I feel like some of the things I've been seeing that does get lost to a certain degree and we're going to make an effort not to do that here because although Adnan may be a victim that that very well may be the case we're not certain of that but what we are certain of is that Haye was murdered and if if it's not Adnan that means that her murderer is still out there somewhere so either way at the core of this we have to remember what's really really important it's to get justice for Haye and her family And we're trying to figure out how Adnan is involved with this, if he is at all. So that is very important. Like I said at the beginning, we don't want someone serving time for something they didn't do. But either way,

even if we say Adnan didn't do it, that just means that the real killer is still out there. And that means Hay hasn't gotten the justice she deserves. So I was saying before we started recording with Stephanie, everyone knows the Adnan name. I think a lot of people know Hay Minley's name, but definitely not as many as Adnan Saeed. So we're going to try to make a conscious effort to do that here because that is what's really important. Well, I mean, that's why I'm spending so much time in this first episode talking about her because yes, by default, as we go through, once Hayes no longer with us and we go into the timelines after that, a lot of focus is going to be on Adnan and what he said and what he did and what people said about him. And we're not going

to have the opportunity to talk about Hayes as much. But like you said, we don't know if he's a victim, but we're certain that she is. So we have to really keep that in mind because a lot of people are happy that Adnan's out now and his charge has been vacated, but her family is not. And that's important to keep in mind. They think he did it. They think that the right person. That's interesting. I didn't know that. Yeah. They think the right person was behind bars. Now, does that mean the right person was behind bars?

No, of course not. It means that this is their feeling. Maybe this was their form of closure that they had, and now they feel like they don't even have that. Who knows why they feel that way, but they're entitled to feel that way. They lost somebody and they think that he's responsible and they've asked the judge to reverse the decision. So it's very controversial and it's a

very delicate and sensitive kind of topic. We want to do what's right by everybody and we want anybody who's innocent and hasn't committed any crimes to be talked of as such. But we don't know for a fact that Adnan Saeed didn't do anything wrong. So we're going to try to figure that out. But Hayman Lee was a person who was awesome, actually, as we're going to talk about it, because I read her entire diary several times. She was funny and smart, and she was in so many ways a typical teenage girl, but in so many other ways not. And you could say that about anybody. We don't know these people, these victims personally. So we kind of look at them as like archetypes almost.

And we try to put them in boxes. But to the people who knew them, they were so special, so unique. And I want to try to deliver that to you so that you understand this is a big loss to the world, no matter how she died, no matter who did it. Yeah, I'm so glad you said that. And I'm glad that you brought that up, because that was something that I was wondering as we were seeing all the news coverage of this charge being vacated and Adnan walking out and everyone applauding this and showing him eating his first Chinese take a leftover food and making a big deal about it. And I wondered how him and Lee's family thought about it, because there's a world where they're sitting at

home and this is just revictimizing them yeah this is just traumatic for them to see who they believe murdered their daughter walking out free and not only walking out free but having a lot being celebrated for something that you know he may have done so I'm really glad we did it I'm really glad we're covering it like that from that angle because when I started hearing about cereal I was only hearing his name to be completely transparent I wasn't hearing her name nearly as much as I was hearing his name so as much as we can involve her to make sure that you guys and everybody else who happens to listen to this on audio or on video, you're going to know

her name by the end of this. And you're going to be very familiar with her. And I always used to say this on Breaking Homicide. We didn't want to know just who they were at the time when they died, but who they were in life, who they were as people, because that was taken from us and their family. And we want them to be remembered, not just for what happened to them, but who they were when they were with us. So it's important. Weird transition, but we got to cover it because I'm that guy. Let's take a quick break and we'll be right back. So Hay kept a diary, which was used as evidence during the trial. And this diary was actually a notebook that she had purchased during a French class field trip to the Monet exhibit. And the first page of the diary is so precocious and so funny, it gives some great

insight into who Hay was. So the opening page says, quote, this book is open to those whose heart is innocent. If you feel any guilt reading this, then you should stop. This book is full of my experiences. This may make you angry, sad, happy, mad, and or cry. So do enter at your own risk. Dedicated to those who I love and love me back. Do love and remember me forever since I'll always love you all. End quote. So she's basically saying like, listen listen i'm not saying keep out but i'm being honest in here i'm gonna be honest up in this in this book and if you are afraid of what you might read don't read it that's a pretty cool take my my daughter tenly hers just says dad don't touch dead serious well i guess hay just like assumed like she talks about her younger brother right her brother was

16 at this time so a couple years younger than her and she's like in one she's like in one um one entry she says like oh I know he read this and he probably reads this because he has no life and I have a life so like I know you're reading this so she just kind of assumes that people are gonna read it and that maybe members of her family are going to open it. And she's like, well, if you do, you might read something you don't like. So don't blame me. You've been warned. Yeah, exactly. Hay started writing in her diary on April 1st, 1998. And she mentioned that the junior prom was coming up and she'd encouraged her friend to ask a boy named Nick, a boy that it seems Hay either had a crush on previously or she had gone out with him previously. But now she said she's

over Nick because she has Adnan. She said, quote, I got Adnan. He makes me feel so special. Unlike Nick, who is a player, Adnan actually apologized for Laura sitting on his lap. How many guys would do that? I think I might just love him. End quote. A few days later, on April 5th, Hay writes that she thinks things between her and Adnan need to slow down because he was moving way too fast for her. But she also says something like, it's okay, you know, he's just moving a little fast, but that's fine. And she doesn't really mention it again. Now, there are claims made that Adnan and Hay were sexually active, that they had sex. And I believe I read this in Rabia Chaudhry's book, which is called Adnan's Story. So once again, keep that in mind, consider the source. You know, we might have some unreliable narrators here. As far as I know, Haye at least never wrote in her diary that this happened, although she does mention, you know, being intimate and, you know, getting close and things like that. It's possible that it happened, but she never came right out and said it. And until, you know, I read something where she did, I'm not going to say one way or the other

what happened. Right. And this was in April of 98. Yeah. And she was killed in 99, correct? January of 99. January. So a few months. So something could have transpired. I don't know how their relationship developed. Obviously, we're going to get into that tonight. She may not have written it in the book because maybe she didn't want someone to see that specific part. That could be part of it. Knowing people are reading it, maybe she decided to omit that fact. It's possible. It is very possible, but I don't think it's relevant whether they had sex or not. I don't personally think it's relevant.

Although, now that I said that, it may be considering any guilt that either Adnan or Hay felt in the aftermath of that. And we're going to get into that, why they may have felt guilt. Because, you know, normal teenage kids probably aren't going to feel that way. But Hay and Adnan did come from strict families, both. Hay's family wasn't as religious. They were more like culturally strict. But Adnan's family was both culturally and religiously strict because he was a Muslim. So they both may have felt some guilt from that due to their upbringings. I did have a question for you that kind of came from what you just said. And I think it's important as far as like framing the mindset going forward, thinking about motives and all that good stuff.

You said that she was strangled. That's how she did. That's the cause of death. Was she sexually assaulted as well? That hasn't been disclosed. That's the cause of death. Was she sexually assaulted as well? That hasn't been disclosed. It's still sort of uncertain. Some people speculate that she may have been, but we'll get more into that and that sort of like path of speculation once we get to the autopsy. Okay, good. Two days later, on April 7th, 1998, Hay wrote, quote, Someone please smack me. What the fuck am I doing? I am pushing Adnan away. Damn my grandma and mother. Shit, I can't get close and he can't get close to me. This is pretty fucked up. He is way too sweet and all. What is happening? I can't believe things are about to blow up in my face. Sigh. My life's a bitch. End quote. Now, this narrative may be confusing to some, but the reason I said that dating Adnan didn't seem to be a normal hey decision was that it was strictly forbidden for both hey and Adnan.

Adnan's parents were very conservative Muslims from Pakistan. That meant no drinking, no smoking, and no romantic relationships before marriage. Maybe this pressure from both families only made everything feel more real and passionate because Adnan and Hay would have to keep their love secret from their families, and there was something forbidden and exciting about that. In fact, Adnan later claimed he felt it was easy to date someone whose family was also very strict, saying, quote, it was really easy to date someone that kind of lived in the same parameters that I did with regards to, you know, she didn't have expectations of me coming to her house for dinner with her family. She understood that if she was to call my house and, you know, speak to my

mother or father, I would get in trouble and vice versa. So we would have to kind of set up our talks on the phone. Usually we would talk late at night when our parents were sleeping, end quote. So when Adnan asked Hay to be his date for the junior prom, she said yes without a second thought, and they both got ready for the dance at different friends' homes so that neither of their parents would catch on. Now, according to Hay's journal, the night of junior prom was a truly magical one, even though she and Adnan had had a huge fight the day before. And there's a lot of mentions like this in her diary where, oh, we had a big fight today, but we made up. Oh, we had a big fight, but we figured things out. It happens a lot. They're on and off a lot. So at the prom, Hay and Adnan took pictures together and with their friends from the magnet program. Hay wrote in her journal, quote, me and Adnan were dancing like

crazy, hugging and kissing. I swear he is the sweetest guy. Let me tell you why. He was the prom prince, and Stephanie McPherson was prom princess, and traditionally, they were supposed to dance together to my song, KC and JoJo's, all my life. I tried to act natural and unjealous, but it did kind of bother me. But I took the pic of them dancing and sat next to Deb, who went on about how neat it is for Adnan to be the prince. Ten seconds later, guess who danced with me and not with Stephanie? Adnan. Now, how can I not fall in love with this guy?

Of course, I gave him his first kiss on the lips. Then I totally fell in love with him." So that's interesting because we talked about Adnan earlier as far as Hay mentioning that he was going a little too fast. But clearly we have a little bit more insight into that now. It couldn't have been too, too much because she's describing after that, that they had their first kiss on the lips at prom. So a junior prom. So that's good to know. So before this, they were just sort of like seeing each other and like flirting and crushing on each other. And then

after junior prom, it was like they were official. But they did date for seven months, right? So we're going to assume that from the moment they start off, you know, she thinks that giving him his first kiss on the lips is this official thing. We're officially dating now. This is like a big deal for her. But as time goes on, yeah, it'll probably get closer, more intimate and more sexually driven. If I know anything about 17 and 18 year old kids, which I do, because I was one once. Very long time ago. Fuck you. I remember it like it was yesterday. Sometimes I still feel like an 18-year-old kid and act like one, too. Never.

So, 17-year-old Adnan, he was the epitome of tall, dark, and handsome. Over six feet tall with caramel-colored skin, piercing eyes, and a mop of perfectly tousled black hair that it seemed many high school girls wanted to run their fingers through. He was an honor roll student. He played football and ran on the track team. His after-school job was working as an EMT. And he won Prince of the Junior Prom because he was incredibly charming, popular, and just overall a well-liked kid. The prom princess was Stephanie McPherson, another student from from the magnet program and a close friend to both Adnan and Hay and Stephanie's gonna pop up again in these episodes because she's important to the timeline and the narrative and she would go on to date a former Woodlawn High School student named Jay Wilds and anybody who's listening to this who is familiar with the case at all will know Jay is

hugely, hugely relevant to this case. Now, the rest of Adnan and Hay's relationship, according to Hay's diary, it played out like any other high school romance. It sounded so dramatic and exhausting, to be completely honest, made even more dramatic and exhausting by the fact that they had to keep it a secret from their family members. Hay talks about herself and Adnan hanging out with friends, going to Burger King, making out in parking lots, holding hands in the hallways, and giving each other little tokens of affection. And for a while, Hay and Adnan were the it couple of Woodlawn High School. In one diary post, Hay wrote, quote, Adnan is the sweetest guy. I love him to death. Guess what he did? He was supposed to go to his mentor right

after third period. Guess what he did instead? He went out and picked up a single rose for me, and he gave it to me in physics in the middle of the class. Everyone was staring. All I could do was just look surprised and just kiss him in the middle of class. All day I walked around with my rose. Everyone was telling me how cute it is at all. I got lots of awes and cutes. It was lovely. End quote. But like I said, a lot of drama intersperses their romantic gestures. First of all, we have Nick, okay, the guy that Hay used to date or like, and apparently he was going around telling everyone that Hay was a tease. And Hay talks about in her diary, like, you know, oh, he's just mad that I don't want him anymore. Why would I want him when I have Adnan?

And then Nick started going around telling people that Hay and Adnan were doing things in the tech room, which Hay claims were lies. And in mid-May, there were problems with the relationship, where it was suggested that Adnan had been so religious before he met Hay, but Hay had changed him, and she didn't quite know how to feel about that. She acknowledged that she does think he changed, but she doesn't want to be responsible for pulling him away from who he is. On May 15th, Hay wrote that she and Adnan were on a break. And this was a break that she had sort of brought on. And she did this for three reasons. First, she said that she knew she loved him, but she didn't know if he felt the same way.

And she wrote, quote, It irks me to know that I am against his religion. He called me a devil a few times. I know he was only joking. It's somewhat true. I hate that. It's like making him choose between me and his religion. The second thing is the possessiveness. I'm a very independent person. I rarely rely on my parents. Although I love him, I don't need him. I know I'll do just fine without him, and I need time for myself and with my friends other than him. How dare he get mad at me for planning to hang with Aisha? The third thing is the mind play. I'm sure it's out of jealousy. Shit, I don't get jealous, and I think whoever is

trying to make me jealous is a fool because you'll definitely lose me. I prefer a straight relationship that doesn't get people mixed in. He just wanted to play mind games. End quote. So, listen. Hay didn't like the feeling that she was a devil who was pulling Adnan away from his religion. She didn't like the fact that he was possessive and she didn't like mind games, which it looks like, you know, Adnan was sort of playing, maybe trying to make her jealous. And this is one of the things that I listened to when this first came out.

And I was like, oh, this makes complete sense. You know, she's overreacting about this. He didn't mean anything by it. I'm sure that he was just kidding around. But now I see it a little differently. Asha Pittman, who was Hay's best friend, she remembered that Anon did seem to be too involved in Hay's life. And he would show up uninvited to, you know, time that Hay was with her girlfriends or girls' nights or whatever. Asha said, quote, I think it was mostly normal, but he kind of just generally always annoyed me. The constant paging of her. If she was out, he was like, well, I just wanted to know where you were.

And it was like, I told you where I was going to be. If she was at my house and we were having a girls' night, he would stop by. He would walk over and try to hang out. And it's just like, have some space. It's one of those things at first. It's like, oh, it's so cute. Your boyfriend's dropping by. But after the 10th time, it's like, really? End quote. So this is really good insight because when you initially said or quoted Hay about him not moving too fast, I'm thinking it's sexual in nature. And then that was completely canceled out by the fact that less than a month later, it's the first kiss on the lip. So clearly it wasn't sexual. But now hearing all this. like going with it you know what i mean so i think he was pushing her maybe she thought kissing on the lips before they were officially dating was was going too fast was going too fast yeah i do

think it was let me throw this at you though okay let me throw this at you it could also be maybe him wanting to always be near her wanting to hold hands wanting to like put his arms around her kind of show people that she's with him. That could also be interpreted as moving too fast. Like, hey, we're not there yet. Why are you always standing next to me or wanting to hold hands while we're walking down the hallway? We're not together yet. So hearing that, it made me think, especially with what you just said, where from this point, we don't know if they're sexually active yet or not in the sense of like, they're actually having sex. We know they're doing some things. We don't know what. always kept very close tabs on her and you hear you're hearing this from a third party and asia

but also in some ways maybe from hey and and again it could be interpreted both ways you guys come to your own conclusions it could be the angle of when she said he's moving too fast or whatever that could be sexual or it could just be from a more just kind of the way they acted around each other like again not necessarily making out or for lack of a better way to describe it, like being handsy in a sexual way, but just wanting to always have your arm around her, always be near her Walker from class to class that could have been interpreted by, Hey, as moving a little too fast. We're not together yet. Maybe I'm, maybe I'm going to be with you. Maybe I'm not, but you're already treating me like I'm your girlfriend and I'm not,

you're moving too fast. We have the benefit now years later to know why we're talking about this. So we're not overanalyzing this because this is all we have. And when we're trying to figure out what happened in the people we're dealing with, these are the things that you kind of have to rip apart and dissect because we know the end story. We know what happened at the end of all this. So we have to reverse engineer it. And this is what we're doing. Yeah, I think you're right. And I think in certain contexts, like you could write it off as normal high school behavior, right?

You could be like, oh, that's just how high school kids are. And, you know, boys haven't developed yet and they have insecurities so they can be jealous. I know that of all the boyfriends I've had, I've never had a boyfriend who was more jealous than my high school boyfriend, for instance, because they're young and they haven't figured out what's going on with the world yet. And I also think that sometimes high school girls or young girls in general will look at that and think like, oh, he's so possessive of me. That means he loves me, kind of like a Christian gray sort of toxic thing. And I do believe that in these current years, these more modern times, that's become less of a desirable thing in a partner. Women understand now that it can be toxic and usually somebody being possessive of you isn't great. But when you're a young girl, you think that when someone's being possessive of you like that or controlling, it's almost showing that they value you. And sometimes it is, but

sometimes it can go too far. And I guess what we have to decide here was, did it go too far? Or was this just normal high school stuff? And we're going to take a quick break. And when we come back, I want to have a little bit more of a discussion about that, because some things that I saw, let me know that I don't think it was normal. All right. So we are back from the break. And I do want to mention Hayes' entire diary is available for anyone to read. I found it on Scribd, but they have it on websites.

I think it's even on the Undisclosed podcast website as well. But something that did bother me on my third listen through the serial podcast is that in episode two, Sarah Koenig says, quote, Hay does not describe Adnan as overbearing or possessive in her diary, end quote. Verbatim, this is what she says. But reading Hay's diary, you know, I disagree. She does describe Adnan that way sometimes. And that may just be her perception of the situation. It doesn't mean that he was that way, you know, in the interest of being fair, but also in the interest of being fair, saying Hay doesn't describe Adnan that way is unequivocally false, in my opinion. In fact, if what Hay wrote is true, it sounds to me as if Adnan were getting maybe some heat at home for not being as focused on his religion and his culture. And he was kind of projecting that onto Hay, looking to her as the reason he was less focused and the less devout and maybe, maybe gaslighting her a little bit so that she too would see herself as like the catalyst for these negative changes in him.

So she would see herself as the devil in the Garden of Eden, holding an apple and tempting him to sin. Oh, Jesus. That was deep. That was deep. Well, I mean, when did you when she says like he says I'm a devil sometimes like what? No, listen, I'm definitely reading between the lines because it doesn't sound like she went into detail. But I think about myself at 16, 17, 18 years old and what I was fighting about with my girlfriends at the time. And it's usually over another guy or you being at lunch with that person or walking through the hallway. So when you're talking about a very new relationship and they're already having these arguments or these problems, my speculation is that it was

probably over maybe Nick, maybe other boys and just perception of Adnan and Hay's relationship to each other, what they were seeing, what they were fighting about, jealousy. Again, you're young. Even Hay herself said that it was something where Adnan almost danced with that other girl and it bothered her a little bit, but then he surprised her and didn't do that. It could be taken as sweet or it could be taken as Adnan's looking at Hay as his property and he wants everyone to know she's

with him now i'm not saying it's bad or good i'm not presenting her with roses in the middle of middle school yeah can i be honest yeah when you were saying that people are going to come after me for this i thought that was a little weird it's weird i'll be i i know it's like sweet or whatever as and maybe as kids it is i don't know tell me what you guys think I really want to hear maybe I just you know Leaving school or whatever going to skip something to go get her a rose. Is it to be sweet or is it so that? People know again. She's with him Might be overlooked might be looking too deep into this at this point

but trying to see if there's anything in between the words that would suggest a certain pattern of behavior by Adnan or Hey, at that point, or anybody else that she's interacting with by our journal entries. Well, first of all, I think these magnet kids were like running free. I think they did whatever the hell they want. They were doing their own thing out there. I mean, it's like, she's like, he gave me a rose in the middle of class. And what could I do? I just kissed him in the middle of class. Like if that was me in high school, we'd be like in school suspension. And if it ever happened again, we'd be on our asses outside. Our parents would be getting called, you know, like he'd just be walking in and disrupting the

class. These magnet kids, man, they did whatever they wanted. It seemed like they were so gifted. Like I said, I don't want anybody coming for me well, you can come in for me if you want but I Know there's a lot of fans of Adnan as far as like what's going on This has no this is no indictment on what's gonna happen as we go through other episodes But we're just looking into what he's saying right now and my initial impression is that maybe he was a little possessive He will he liked for people to know who his girl was, especially if he's someone who hasn't been very sexually active with women in the past.

According to Hay, that was his first kiss on the lips. Was that Junior Braum? No, I think it was their first kiss. This is something new for him. It was their first kiss on the lips. Not necessarily his. Okay, that's good. I thought it was his first kiss on the lips.

Yeah, I don't think so. But I will say, you just said we had to sort of read between the lines and you think he may have been possessive. No, we did not have to read between the lines. And that's why I'm so annoyed with Sarah Koenig for saying, what did she literally say? She said, Haye does not describe Adnan as overbearing or possessive in her diary. Let's go up to Hayes' diary. The second thing is the possessiveness. She says it. There's three reasons that I am taking a break from Adnan.

One is that he calls me a devil and I'm pulling him away from his religion. The second is the possessiveness. She literally says it. And then the third thing is the mind play. And I think it's out of jealousy. So she's not, what is Sarah Koenig talking about? Oh, Hay does not describe Adnan as overbearing or possessive in her diary. Yes, she does.

So I'm not sure why this was kind of made out to be like, Hay was completely okay with it. Because yes, does she go on to say like, oh, she loves him and he's wonderful. Yeah, there's tons of that in the diary. But it doesn't matter if 95% of the diary is her saying that he's wonderful and beautiful and a miracle. When on certain pages, she's saying, I have a problem with the fact that he's possessive and he gets jealous. That's just it.

Yeah, and they're important. Those are things that are equally important, if not more important. I agree, because when you're a kid like that and you're young, like, yeah, you're going to overlook the flaws because you're in love and you want everything to be perfect, like a storybook, like the Disney movies that you grew up on. You don't want to see the flaws. So the fact that a 17 or 18 year old girl is seeing the flaws and noting them enough to talk about them means that they were pretty prevalent, in my opinion. Couple that with other friends kind of corroborating that as well. Exactly. He was paging her constantly. So now you have the diary, which that diary is for her and her little brother at some times, but mainly for her to kind of digest what she's going through, talk it out with herself.

She's not doing this because she knows she's going to be murdered at a later date. She's doing it to kind of get those thoughts out of her head and onto paper so she can process it. So this is something that's coming from her heart and her head. And then you have a friend who is also kind of stating the same thing, not knowing that she had written this in her diary. So I feel like there's a lot of credibility in that. I completely agree. And listen, the fact that Adnan is possessive or jealous, the fact that he was very religious or came from a very religious family and would make comments to Hay like, you know, you're pulling me away from my religion. Does that mean that he killed her? No, not necessarily. Of course not. But I do think it would be irresponsible to overlook this context. And in her diary, Hay wrote, quote, he told me his religion means life to him. He tried to remain a faithful Muslim all his life, but he fell in love with me, which is a great sin. But he told me there's no way he'll ever leave me because he can't imagine a life without me. Then he said that one day he would have to

choose between me and his religion. I love him so much and when it comes to choosing, I'm going to let him go his way. If you have to deny yourself a part of you for love, then that's not good. I really couldn't care less since my religion doesn't mean shit to me. But to him, his religion guides his life. I hate the fact that I'm the cause of his sin. He said I shouldn't feel like I'm pulling him away from his religion, but hello, that's exactly what I'm doing. I don't know. We'll live through all this, but this is bad. Now I'm going to anticipate the day when things will come to an end, end quote. So later, after Hay died or was murdered, after Hay was murdered, later Adnan would say that he

meant it as a joke, that he would keep bringing this up as a joke, like, ha ha, because I'm dating you, I'm going to hell. But he never meant it the way Hay seemed to have taken it, according to him. Adnan told podcast host Sarah Koenig that he was culturally a Muslim, but he wasn't all that religious, and he'd been dating girls and smoking weed and doing things that his parents would frown upon before he became Hay's boyfriend. Adnan said, quote, maybe it seems convenient for me to say that now, but the only thing I can say to, I wouldn't say prove it in a way, is that my behavior didn't change once Hay broke up with me. It's not like all of a sudden I'm like, okay, the whole big sin is out of my life. No, I just continued with the same type of behavior. It was just different people. End quote. And that's fair. To be honest,

that's fair. Once they broke up, he's acknowledging the fact that, yeah, he's obviously going to say this now. I'm assuming he gave this interview while he's behind bars, right? So he's giving this interview. It wouldn't be in his best interest to be like, yeah, no, that makes me look terrible. So he's saying, Hey, listen, I understand that it may seem convenient, but don't judge, you know, don't take my word for it. After we broke up, I was continuing to do the same thing that I was doing beforehand without kind of any, without skipping a beat. So he's saying, Hey, go, go check out my behavior. Talk to people. I dated, talk to people I was hanging out with, and you'll see that there wasn't this dramatic change in my demeanor after we broke up, which that's a fair argument. I respect it. Yeah, if it's true, it's fair.

Absolutely. I agree. 100%. Yeah. He's telling us to go check it out, but sometimes people say, hey, yeah, go check it out. You'll see. And then you do. And it's exactly the opposite of what they were saying it was going to be. But do you think like, because I don't see it like that. I don't see a change in somebody as being temporary while the thing that changed you exists. As far as I know, or for the majority of the time, when you're young, especially if you have a bad influence that causes you to do something and you start going down that path, usually when that bad influence is gone, you've already, you know, kind of changed. And you're not just going to be like, oh, revert back to who you were before, because you've already been changed. You know, you weren't just temporarily modified, you changed.

And, you know, according to Hay, Adnan was telling her that when he started dating her, he changed. So is she lying in her diary? Is she making this all up? Are these conversations that she's having with him, which is repeatedly happening in her diary where she's mentioning it, where he's saying like, oh, I'm really getting away from what's important to me. I'm getting away from my religion. You're the devil. LOL. Haha. Why would he keep bringing it up? Why would he keep talking about it? You know, like if it wasn't one of those things where it's like, just kidding. But but really, that's how I feel. You know, I feel like when those those kinds of scenarios come up in conversations,

in relationships, it's like it's kind of how you always joke and you're like, oh, I hate you and you drive me crazy. Haha. I'm just kidding. But like, really, I do drive you crazy. There's some truth to it. I agree. I agree with what you're saying. I don't think that he's just come, that's not really something you joke about either. You know, it's kind of, that's kind of deep. You know, we start and talk about religion, things like that. That's a more serious conversation. He may have been presenting it to her, like you just just said in a funny way to not come over to to make it too serious where it scares her away but kind of passively letting her know what he's doing for her you know how he's changing for her how he always wants this is everything that he's doing

is against the grain it's not what his parents would want So he wants her to understand it's for her the sacrifices he's making for her yeah, and I do think I I I agree with that if he was if there wasn't some Bit of truth in it. I don't see the significance of saying that it's funny There's plenty of other things you can joke about. Yeah, and if you keep bringing it up like more than once It's like at some point the other person's gonna be like like, oh, is this a joke? Or is it because this is like the fifth time you've said it? Like, this is it's not really funny. I'm starting to

feel guilty and I'm starting to feel bad about it. And she clearly did feel guilty and bad about it. I know we joked about it earlier, but let's acknowledge the fact that Adnan was very smart, but so wasn't Hay. And so they're very aware of their surroundings, they're articulate, intelligent, young guy people. And I feel like Hay had a pretty good read on him. So for her to write it in the journal entry, the diary entry, there was something there that struck her as something significant and that she should make note of. So I feel like she would understand if it was a joke or not, or if there was some truth there. And that's probably why she decided to write it down. Absolutely. I do this with my husband all the time when I'm working during the day. I hope he doesn't listen to this, but when I'm working during the day and

I see him like sitting on the couch, like scrolling through Instagram, I'm like, Oh, it must be nice to not do shit during the day. Just, just kidding. And then I'll like do do that several times during the week and he'll get mad and I'll be like, oh shit. I didn't even realize I was doing it, but I'm kind of doing it because I want you to understand that I would like you to get up and clean the toilets. But at the same time, I don't want to be a bitch, but I still want you to get up and clean the bathrooms. Story of our lives. Adam, we feel you, brother. We're all there. We're all there. Hey, before we dive right back into,

I know we have more coming up with some dates. Let's take our last break and we'll dive right back into it. So this break that Hay initiated, it didn't last too long. A few days later, Adnan and Hay made up. And on May 21st, 1998, Hay wrote that it was her baby's birthday. In her diary, Hay refers to Adnan as my baby quite often.

So she got him Scooby-Doo boxers. Adnan loved them and she loved Adnan so much. And that's basically what the next few, what are they called? The next few chapters of her diary. Entries. Entries were just her being very happy. Everything's good. The good vibes continued until June.

And at that point, she wrote, quote, one day we'll get married and be happy. I can't wait till the day me and my baby can be together openly, end quote. And this, I think, is something that we do need to realize that Adnan's family were probably never going to be okay with him dating Hay. They probably wouldn't be okay with him marrying Hay. And Hay's family, they didn't seem to like the fact that Adnan was her date to the junior dance or the junior prom. So I don't think that they would be very okay with her marrying Adnan either. They come from two different cultures, two different religions. And I do want to say that a lot of the conversation around this case had to do with the fact that Adnan was a Muslim, that he came from a very religious family and people said, oh, they just thought that he that he killed Hay

because he was a Muslim. And I disagree. At least I don't look at it that way. I know many amazing Muslims. I know many asshole Muslims. I know many amazing Christians. I know many asshole Christians. The fact I think the issue here is religious extremism in any form because it can get extreme. It can get to the point where you start to feel a lot of guilt because you're not behaving in a way that that you were taught all your life you should be behaving. And that can make you lash out and it can make you not feel like yourself. I mean, look at Mormons. People always talk shit about Mormons and they say like, oh, Mormons are crazy. We've got Josh and Susan Powell. This is a terrible thing that happened basically because of his

devotion to his religion that made him so rigid he couldn't see his way around it. So religious extremism in any form is bad, no matter what label it has. But I'm not going to sit over here and if Anand was a Mormon, I'm not going to say, oh, this is because he's a Mormon. No, but it does have an impact on your mental state and your emotional state. So I don't think it's because of an anti-Islam kind of idea that people have in this country. Maybe, I mean, this was 1999. So this was even before the World Trade Center. That was 2001, right? is that because of his religion, which he has said to Hay is very important to him, he is doing a lot of things that are causing stress for him. He's risking a lot for Hay. And I'm sure as a young teenager, that's a tough thing to do when you're indirectly lying to your family every single day. And that is a form of disrespect. And even though he's voluntarily willing to do it, it's still something that's probably

stressing him out and putting a burden on him and something that puts him in a tough mental state where he's trying to balance his feelings for Hay with his love and respect for his family, trying to find that happy medium. But I could see a world where something he views as a sacrifice for Hay, by not having her reciprocate that or be willing to let that go, he could be extremely offended by it later. Where it's like, I did all this for you. I sacrificed so much for you. I disrespected my family's wishes and our religion for you. And you're just willing to throw that away. And that could be something that may potentially anger him. That is one way to look

at it. Exactly. So that's what I'm trying to say. That's what the prosecution used, basically, in their in their argument in trial against him. They said, you know, exactly what you just said. But then Adan's supporters came out and they were like, oh, you know, they painted him as this like evil Muslim man. They said he was like this religious extremist and that's why he did it. And that's not true at all. He wasn't even that religious. He didn't feel like he had to do this or that. And I'm just saying, like, it is a possible motive. We can't write it off just because we're afraid to touch on topics concerning religion, because religion is a big driving force in many people's lives.

And by the way, to the supporters, I think you you're right because if he was such an extremist, he wouldn't be willing to date Hey, you know there we know that in some religions what the extent that people go with especially regarding women And so if he was such an extremist, he wouldn't have violated those traditions to to date her He would have been he would have wanted no part of her. He wouldn't held hands her. There's a lot of things within the Muslim culture where he wouldn't even have, he wouldn't even gotten to a point where he could be in a relationship, whether because he was a quote unquote extremist, which he's clearly not. I agree with them where he was clearly not that religious because he was doing things that are opposite of what was expected to him on a daily basis. But I do think his religion could come into play later as far as his feelings towards Hay because of the things that in his eyes were considered sacrifices.

And that's not me putting words in his mouth. He's passively said this to her on numerous occasions in a joking manner, which we just discussed. And he's admitted to saying that. Yeah. Occasions in a joking manner, which we just discussed and he's saying that yeah, the thoughts that are running through his head that he's realizing It's probably a he's pulling both ways where it's like I love her, but I love my family and i'm doing this for her So I hope she appreciates it You know, that's that's the way you could look at it. I completely agree so I did want to get that out of the way because that has been something that Has been like the the driving force in getting justice that he was looked at as this, you know, follower of Islam.

And because he's a follower of Islam, he's a violent man. I don't really think that anybody ever saw him that way. But once again, religion is something that runs deep. It runs deep through generations. It runs deep through generations. It runs deep through history. Religion has caused many people to do many terrible things in all throughout the history of the world. So we have to keep in mind that although

we don't like to talk about it and it feels awkward sometimes, religion's a big driving force for a lot of people and it clearly was for his family. And he wouldn't have been making those jokes if it wasn't there in the back of his mind, those jokes, quote unquote. No, there were definitely thoughts he was having, but yeah, to the defenders of Adnan, yeah, if he was a devout Muslim, he wouldn't have dated Hay in the first place. He definitely wouldn't be kissing her openly in class.

I can tell you that right now. That's definitely against religion. So I tend to agree with them. If that's the angle they played, that this was some extreme act of because of his religion. I think that I think they're missing with that one, but it could be a factor in other ways. um after all he had done it was kind of like you know he had told her i am you know gonna eventually have to choose between you and my religion i will choose you and then at the end of the day she didn't choose him so maybe he felt you know a little offended and hurt yeah yeah i could see that angle if that's the angle i based on everything you've laid out so far and based on what Hay has told us about their relationship, I think that's a possible reason for if he's involved. Yeah, I could see that. So Adnan, they're always trying to figure out a way to talk to each other and see each other outside of school. And he would drive to Hay's house after everyone was asleep at his house and her house.

And then they would talk to each other through the basement window for hours. But then the trouble started again in mid-June when Hay wrote, quote, well, he couldn't come tonight after I waited up for him. Fuck, I'm pretty pissed at him. But then again, he's the one who has to drive over here every night. Fuck, what the hell? Okay, he just fucking hung up the phone on me. Now he just called me and it rang once. I'm going to be in mad trouble. Shit. At least I'll get to be mad at him when I go away. Fuck. This is so getting to me. I'm so about to let this boy go. Sigh. But I'll probably be sad if I do that, but I could. He's just a guy, right? Definitely confused. End quote. So, wow. Wow. Throwback. The whole using I'm going to be in mad trouble is such a throwback to the 90s. It really is. It really is. So listen, you can see she's kind of like I don't think she's as not committed, but as like tied to him as he is to her this is like serious stuff here these kids they can't

just talk on the phone they have to be in the same vicinity as each other talking through the basement window able to touch maybe able to smell each other she mentions his scent often this is very much young love but it's bordering and like obsessive at this point you know she's staying up till all hours of the night he's gonna gonna come over, he doesn't come over. She's crushed by it. And she's starting to think like, this is kind of pulling me away from what I need to be doing.

Like I shouldn't be staying up all night. I should be studying and going to bed and getting a good night's sleep. But here I am waiting for this guy. He doesn't even show up. And now I'm gonna, you know, be really upset. And apparently, Hay and Adnan, they had this foolproof phone system

for when they wanted to talk. And apparently, Hay and Adnan, they had this foolproof phone system for when they wanted to talk, and it did not ever include calling each other's homes directly. So obviously, this was before the age of cell phones, but right at the point where pagers were very popular. So both Hay and Adnan, they had a pager, and when they wanted to talk, one would page the other when everyone was sleeping. So for instance, if Adnan paged Hay, she would then pick up her home phone and make a call, usually to a 1-800 number, like the weather service. And then she would wait on the weather service. And then Adnan would call while Hay was still on the phone with the weather service. And this would ensure that the phone

wouldn't ring at the house. And then Hay would just get a call waiting beep and she would answer it. So maybe I'm looking too deep into it. Tell me if I am, because obviously our commenters can't, but they have this system, the soundproof system in place. They were fighting and because they were fighting and she maybe wasn't responding to Adnan, he calls the house and lets it ring one time to let her know, you better call me back. You better answer or I'm going to blow up your spot. I don't think he did that accidentally from what she's saying. It sounds like he called and he hung up after the first ring because he knew that she wasn't waiting on the other line. That could be interpreted a certain way. But I could be looking too deep into that.

What do you think? Am I? Well, she says that he hung up on her. So it looks like they were on the phone at one point and maybe she was upset and she was like, you know, screw this. I can't believe you didn't show up. I'm so pissed. Like maybe I don't have a logical reason to be pissed because once again, you are the one driving over here every night and you just couldn't make it. But I am pissed. And he was like, well, fuck this. And he hung up. Right. And then maybe he, you know, tried to get a hold of her again,

which would be to page her, but maybe he just called the house because he hung up and he was like, oh shit, I hung up. And then he paged her to let her know he was gonna call again, and she just didn't get on the 1-800 service. She didn't do the weather service. Yeah, because she was like, I don't want to talk to him.

And then he called and hung up really quick, realizing that she wasn't on the other end of the line which I thought and yeah that makes it kind of like her fault possibly yeah more innocent yeah and let me preface it by saying this to teenagers they do a lot of dumb shit including myself so 99% of what we talked about tonight could be just thrown off to the idea that these are teenagers puppy love doing dumb things because it happens all the time however this is a different situation there was an escalation here that ultimately resulted in the death of hay now it could be not it could be

somebody else but when we're looking at potential suspects we have to dissect the behaviors to try to see if there's something in there that we can figure out what happened and more importantly, why it happened. So I know that some of you may be looking at this like, wow, Derek, you're really grasping at straws here or Stephanie, you're really like looking too deep into that. No one's thinking that. Those are your own insecurities again, like the magnet kids, man. The magnet kids. But it's one of those things where we're doing this because we're, again, we have the benefit of knowing the ending of the story.

So we're trying to go back and break everything down and figure out there's anything in there that's worth paying attention to. But I completely understand. We're realist that if this weren't the situation, you could cough these things up to just being young, dumb. And I won't say the final part of that statement. If you know what it is,

then you know what it is. I know what it is. I had no doubt that you did. I had no doubt that you did. There's going to be people in the comments going, somebody tell me what the last part is. No, everyone knows. It rhymes. It rhymes. That's it. I'm stopping. Listen, listen. Haight didn't write in her diary after this for a little while. And when she did, there was a lot to catch up on. So one of Adnan's friends had been in a car accident and he had sadly passed away. And I want to explore this a little bit further in future episodes because it doesn't get talked about a lot. But it seems like this was a very traumatic thing to happen to Adnan.

It really weighed heavily on him. And I want to kind of explore that a little bit more when we talk about this case later. But apparently this death, it had caused Adnan to smoke weed. And this was something that he had promised Hay that he would never do. And she also mentions in future diary entries after this, like that he was depressed. He was depressed. He was depressed. She even says something like, never date a depressed guy because it's very difficult. Like it's so hard to get to him, to reach him sort of. So she mentions that after this, he seems to be depressed and he's smoking

weed. But if you hear it from Adnan, he'd been like smoking weed and doing this stuff since he was 15. So I don't know if he just told her he didn't or he told her he would stop or he did stop for a little while when he was dating her. But then this whole car accident really threw him for a loop and he started again to ease his nerves. I don't know which it is but she didn't like it basically she clearly didn't like him smoking weed so she he probably didn't tell her that he was and then after this happened he used that as the excuse as to hey listen gotta do it yeah and on top of the pressure that he's got from um you know his his friend passing away it also seemed like adnan's parents, specifically his mother,

Shamim, they'd been suspicious that he was dating someone. And Shamim more than Adnan's father. And in fact, Shamim, I guess, had been trying to like convince Adnan's father that he was dating someone. She had found his crown from the junior prom and she was questioning him about it. And, you know, she couldn't really prove it, but she would sometimes pick up the phone when Adnan was on with Hay. She said she could hear him like reciting poetry and she'd get on the phone and he'd be like, mom, get off, you know, and she would grill him about who he was talking to. And she would remind him that it wasn't right to speak romantically with someone outside of marriage. Somehow, Shamim found out that Adnan was at the homecoming dance

in October of 1998 with a girl named Hayman Lee. And it turns out that someone at the dance who was either related to Adnan's parents or knew them called them and let them know that Adnan was there and he was dancing with a girl. And she didn't necessarily know that thisnan was there and he was dancing with a girl and she didn't necessarily know that this girl was the same one Adnan had been dating for seven months she didn't know he was dating anybody for seven months but still she took drastic action Adnan's parents both showed up at the school they made a scene and they dragged Adnan away in front of everyone now it's generally agreed that the homecoming dance was the beginning of the end of Hay and Adnan's relationship, but the night also went down differently depending on who you ask. So the principal at that time of Woodlawn High School, he would, I actually don't know if it's

a man or a woman, so they would testify later at trial that they'd been at the door of the school when Adnan's parents showed up. Quote, it's a big glass window. The dance was in the cafeteria and it's a big glass window. And you can see right out this big glass window. And I was standing right at the entranceway, end quote. So the principal said that Adnan's parents caught their attention because they were standing outside looking into the dance and no one else was doing that. Adnan's parents then went inside and asked for their son, so the principal walked through the dance to find Adnan. Adnan came out.

He and his parents talked off to the side, and then Adnan went back out onto the dance floor and returned, holding the hand of Haemin Lee. Now, according to the principal's court testimony, quote, that's when the voice, the mother's voice, I could hear the mother's voice, I could hear the mother's voice. I don't remember everything she said, but I remember something to the effect of, do you know what you're doing to our family or to our house? And her voice was raised. So at that time, I walked over to them and I took Haley. I told the parents, I said, I can't let you talk to this child like this. Her parents aren't here. And I sent hayley back to the dance and i left him with

his parents and they walked out the door end quote so in rabia chaudry's book adnan's story she mentions that anand's parents did go to the dance and they made adnan leave but as soon as they got home apparently adnan climbed on his bike still wearing tux, and he rode back to the dance so that Hay wouldn't be alone. However, in Rabia's book, she also says that Adnan's mother, Shamim, claims to have not seen or talked to Hayman Lee that night. So basically, they're basically saying the principal story is false, and it never happened. Now, I think it happened. I think it definitely happened because a few of Hay's friends also reported that Hay was very upset, including her best friend Asha. But Adnan's friend, Saad Chaudhry, who is, I believe, Rabia's younger brother and Adnan's best friend, he reported that the night of the homecoming dance, Adnan called him. Saad told Sarah Koenig, quote,

He comes home at like 11 p.m. or like 12 midnight. And I'm like, what happened at your homecoming? And he's like, you're not going to believe this. I'm like, what? He's like, my mom and dad showed up. And I'm like, what? And I mean, we're dying laughing on the phone about this. You know, you know, this is our world. Well, then I'm like, what happened? And well, then they like showed up and made me leave and everyone saw it. How like literally my parents pulled me out of this relationship, end quote. So let's go back over this. Adnan's parents show up. His mother allegedly has words with Hay, basically says, you're doing something bad to our family, to our home.

And they make Adnan leave. He goes back to the dance. And later he calls his friend, also from a Muslim family, and they laugh about it because it's like, this is what we have to deal with being modern teenagers from a Muslim family. But for Hay, it was not very funny. She was very embarrassed, very hurt. And apparently this was a huge catalyst for her to eventually end the relationship a few months later. And it's not like the relationship went right back to normal, though, after the homecoming dance. It didn't end, but it also wasn't the same.

It was once again on and off, hot and cold, very similar to the way it had been for the past seven months. But this time in Hay's diary, it did seem differently because Hay was looking at it differently with less kind of enchantment. You know, the what do they say? Like she didn't have the rose colored glasses on anymore. She was kind of looking at it more realistically. And there was someone else. But before we talk about that, I want to talk to you about this whole homecoming dance scenario. What do you think about it? and how bad I feel for him because clearly he's someone who's trying to balance living. I don't want to say normal because people get offended by that. But what we know is kind of the way it is where you go to school, you can date people and dance with them. And it's not that big of a deal to do that. And yet he's in a situation where his parents are very religious and it doesn't allow him to kind of act the way his counterparts, his fellow students get to act. So he's trying

to balance making them happy with also being happy himself. And at this point, just like many of us, we all have that guy or girl that you fall for in high school and your head over heels for, and you do anything for, and you think you're in love and you're going to marry them. And that in and of itself poses its own problems, right? Cause we're hormonal young and, you know, you're trying to learn who you are as a person and what you like, what you don't like. But on top of that, he's having to deal with this other dynamic. And clearly there's no misconstruing this. His family was extremely strict to show up at the school and embarrass him like that. Cause that is absolutely an embarrassment to him to do that inside the school, whether

it was directly to Hay or just in front of other students to embarrass him like that and force him to leave. That's tough. That's really hard. And if we're to believe Saad, you could see that there was this battle internally in the house because even though they made him leave, he said, I don't care, I'm going back.

And he rode his bike back to the school. So really tough situation for a teenage boy to deal with, with all these other things that we deal with as teenagers. So that is significant. As far as whether or not they talk directly to hey looking at this in the way that we're looking at it for what we're trying to figure out it doesn't seem that significant to me but I also don't see why the principal would lie I don't see why she would have he or she would have a need to lie exactly I think it definitely happened for sure and I think that it probably was a wake

up call to Hay where she was like, these people are never going to accept me. You know, there's like no moving forward with this. Like I had dreams about getting married and things like that. But the reality of it is if we get married, his parents will probably disown him. Like we will not be a part of their family. They will not accept me. And that means they won't accept him and can i be the catalyst for that and i think it says something though about adnan that he talked to his parents and they were like you shouldn't be here let's go and he was like hold on and he went and he brought hay back and he was like this is my girlfriend he was hoping that faced with it they

would be like okay let's talk about this but But they were probably like, no, cut it, end it. They start talking to her, having words with her. And he's like, okay, this isn't gonna work. Once again, they're never going to accept this. So it says something that he was trying to allow her to be a part of his life, a bigger part of his life, and to make her known to his family.

And they still said, absolutely not. And later they were asked, his mother Shamim was asked in an interview, they said, absolutely not. And later, they were asked, his mother, Shamim, was asked in an interview, they said, are you feeling badly now that you were so strict about it? Are you feeling that you should have handled that differently? And she said, absolutely not. In fact, I think we should have been more strict. I think we were too lenient. And that's why this ended up being this way. And that's why he was allowed to kind of run wild and get as far with it as he did, because we were too lenient, which I think is also says a lot. Yeah, they could be making the argument. Hey, listen, if we were more strict because they obviously think their son's innocent.

I'm going to go on a limb and assume that's the case. They're probably saying, hey, listen, if we were more strict, this never would have happened between you two and you wouldn't have been a suspect in the first place. So they're probably looking at it like this validates what our concerns were in the first place adnan you wouldn't be in this trouble if it wasn't for the situation if you had just listened to us so yeah it's a tough situation i think for hey it's one thing to talk about family dynamics of the person you're dating on the phone and hear about it and make jokes about it it's another thing to see it in person and to see how real it is. And if what the principal described happened,

yeah, as a teenager, that'd be traumatic. That'd be tough to hear and see. Yes, and I do wanna mention, because I was, like I said, I was on Reddit and I was looking through some of these things and there was a lot of posts that were talking about this fact that Adnan called his friend when he got home and he was like laughing about it.

And they were like, it was so traumatic and upsetting to hey and Adnan thought that it was just funny it was a joke like he did not take it seriously that makes him like a psychopath or something and I disagree I think you're you're a 17 year old kid even if something really does bother you when you talk to your friend you're not gonna like especially a 17 year old boy you're not gonna cry to your friend and be like oh my parents made me leave the dance you're going to be like this is just what happens this is what we deal with like you're going to make light of it it's very common um and other people did say like he was humiliated and embarrassed about it and he kind of had um talked to people about it later at school and he was like oh that sucked it was

so embarrassing i feel so bad for hayes so i don't And he was like, oh, that sucked. It was so embarrassing. I feel so bad for Hay. So I don't think he was a psychopath in that. No. No. But this might be his way of processing stressful situations as well, right? We talk earlier with Hay saying that he's like, oh, they're going to disown me. I'm going to have to choose between my religion and my family and you. And he's making light of the situation.

Well, maybe that was a way of him processing stressful situations. Maybe that was his way of dealing with those types of things. I definitely feel it was because you can even see in his interviews later with Sarah Koenig, because in Syria, you can hear his interviews when he's on the phone from prison. And he definitely does laugh a lot of things off. And I do same thing so i definitely don't think i would take somebody i loved and continually remind them that i was going to hell because i was with them and they were a devil but as far as other things i can see myself doing this with a friend of mine and laughing it off when really i was humiliated i do want to also mention in her diary hay had talked about um adnan mentioned he was going to move out of his house. So after the

dance, he was kind of like, oh, I'm done with this. Like, I'm going to move out. And she was like, well, I don't know how I feel about this. Like, it's definitely going to cause a wedge between himself and his mother. And, you know, she loves him and he loves her. Like, do I really want to be responsible for this? So it was a constant shadow, a constant dark cloud over their relationship, this whole his family and his religion and how Hay was like interfering with that. So it does, I think, indicate a building pressure. I think you're absolutely right. And we it could be nothing. This could be the lead up to something bigger. And that's why we have to talk about it. We have to talk about it from both angles. So on November 3rd, Hay wrote in her diary, quote, who would have thought we would end like this? Who would have imagined the amount of pain that comes with a broken heart? I know I'm doing the right thing. Call me selfish, but this pain is way less than what it would be if we stayed together. More hostility at his house. I loved you. Oh, screw it. I still love you. I would give

any and everything to be in your arms, but my heart is not that strong. End quote. By December 3rd, Hay was full of hope again that the relationship could work because they were in true love and true love conquers all. However, Hay couldn't figure out how she could love Adnan so much, yet still be so distracted by another young man who she worked with at LensCrafters. On December 6th, she wrote, quote, What's the matter with me? Every time I close my eyes, I see my baby, but I keep on thinking about someone else. Don Klindienst. Why? I don't know. Why? I do like him as a coworker, maybe a friend, but I keep wanting to get closer

to him. A part of me keeps me from Don because of Adnan. A part of me keeps on thinking about Don. I'm going to have to get my thoughts straight. I do love Adnan, but today I kept imagining Don over my body instead of Adnan. Don, Don, Don, Don, Don. why do I keep thinking about your baby blues and your smiles? End quote. And Hay's thoughts about her coworker Don continued until it was almost as if she were fighting herself. Every time she would have a thought about Don or his Camaro or his baby blue eyes, she would follow it with a, you know, I love Adnan exclamation points. One page in her diary is a drawing of both Adnan and Don's name, a visual representation of her confusion. Finally, in mid-December, Hay broke up with Adnan

once and for all, and she begins to focus on Don, although they have yet to go on a date. This is the month before she's brutally murdered, but from all accounts, including Hay's diary, she and Adnan remained friends. On December 23rd, Hay's car skidded on the snow as she was getting on an exit ramp near the mall on her way to work, and there was minor damage to her car. She parked at the mall, she went into her shift, but she did call her friend Adnan to let him know what had happened, and he actually drove to the mall parking lot to inspect the damage on her car. Now, at that time, Don was also walking to his own car in the parking lot, and the two men met face to face. As they were talking, Hay walked out to the parking lot, and they both told her

not to drive her car. It was too dangerous. Don left in his own car, and Adnan gave Hay a ride home. So I just want to mention something before I go on. I'm not sure how this went down, but it would be weird to me if Hay called Adnan or just was like talking to him and mentioned like, oh, yeah, I got some damage on my car. And he unprompted, not asked, decided to drive to the mall and check out the damage. You know, it's almost like inserting himself like, oh, I can be useful to you. I can help you here. You need a man in this situation to let you know whether you can drive your car or not. Here I am. If she did not ask him to do that and he just did

it, once again, we're going the possessive route, like the you need me and let me show you why you need me because I'm going to make your life easier. And here's how. Yeah. So you think, are you asking? Because it sounds, she called him, let him know what happened, but there's no indication as to whether he showed up unsolicited or she asked him to, it just wasn't written here. That's what you're saying?

Right. I'm going to look a little deeper and I'm going to see if I can find it because there is lots of interviews with him and the police and I'm going to look through those. But I'm going to see if I can find it because there is lots of interviews with him and the police and I'm going to look through those. But if she just called him to let him know and didn't say, hey, can you drive out in the snow and look at my car in the mall parking lot? And he was just like doing it as a favor to be helpful and a good friend. You know, that's that's a little weird, I think.

Yeah, we definitely have to look into it more. My gut is to defend Anand here and say, you know, if she's in work, she's still on the clock and she's calling him, maybe she says something like, I don't even know if my car is safe to drive home now. And he's like, oh, I'll come check it out. Or he might not even say that, but he being a good friend, he wants to go up there. So that would be interesting to know more. I had a question for you as well, because I wanted, we know there's no overt mention of whether they were sexually active or not, but that one statement you made about envisioning Don over her body. I think it's subtle, but my initial impression is that if they're over you, something going on there that's probably more than kissing. And so to me,

I think that's a subtle suggestion that they maybe were sexually active at that point. And that was a month before her death. So you would expect at that point, if they had been sexually active, it would have been by that point. So you have that coupled with what Adnan's friends has said that Adnan told him. I think there might be some truth to that. I don't know if that's significant or not. We still have to find out whether she was sexually assaulted or not. But something to note as we're going forward, I've definitely made note of it here.

Yeah, Adnan claims that they were sexually active, that they were having sex. There you go. But once again, I don't know. I don't know why he would lie about it. With everything he's going through, wouldn't you want to say, hey, listen, I've never even had sex with this woman. You know, why would I go this route? I think at that point, there's ways to tell through the autopsy if Hay has been sexually active in the past. So it's something that if it's not with him, it was with someone else.

So it would be in his best interest, to be honest. And so far, we're two hours into this case. I assume that they were more than likely sexually active at the time of her death. Maybe they weren't having sex actively, but they had in the past. That's where my head's at. Where are you at? Yeah, probably. It's just so weird's so weird for me to go right out and say like, yeah, because she clearly like skirted around the issue in her diary. So I don't want to like, you know. Of course. And it might not be significant, but I do think that one statement would lead some people

to believe that there was more than kissing going on. Yes, I agree. There's definitely some context clues there or reading between lines. Right. So that Christmas, because this is December 23rd, but that Christmas, Adnan and Hay even exchanged gifts. And Adnan's gift to Hay was a picture frame that said, best friends. Once again, man, I think it's like just going a little hard unless he's like the sweetest person in the world. And he no like resentment no jealousy no residual feelings unless like she because they were like obsessed with each other he was like i will never choose anything

over you and then she breaks up with him and all of a sudden he's like hey we're besties you know it just seems like so much like he was trying to convince her that he was okay with it to the point where he's like here's a picture frame that says best friends less than two weeks after you broke up with me and broke my heart because his friends were saying he was very upset when she broke up with him and he was crying and he was very sad about it and then all of a sudden he's like cool with it to the point where he can be like best friends with her it's like just going a little too hard to show her that he's okay with it when in fact i don't think he really was and to be

honest with the amount of passion and love that that they claim they felt for each other he probably shouldn't have been okay with it by then and then he's meeting like this new guy that that she's into and it's just i don't know there's what do you think i mean the homecoming incident was in october of 98 and so it wasn't that long you know ago where he was having a they kept dating after that like where right until november but what i'm saying is december until the middle of december well weren't by december okay the middle of december so because of december 23rd they were not dating anymore when he showed up to check out the car right yeah so after the homecoming thing she was like oh we should like take a break like this is a lot and she even wrote him a letter during

that time where she was like you're gonna be fine people break up like you'll move on don't worry about it because apparently he was really upset so then they start like kind of going back together between like that little break after the homecoming dance and their final break in the middle of December. So they're kind of like back together, but it's like weird. Like I said, she starts thinking about somebody else and she keeps trying to almost convince herself that she loves him. And then finally mid-December, she's like, all right, like this isn't, it's not working. It's over. And she breaks up with him. So literally less than two weeks later, he's giving her a picture frame that says best friends. Right. And that's a really. It's over. And she breaks up with him. So literally less than two weeks later, he's giving her a picture frame that says best friends.

Right. And that's a really small window of time. So I agree with you. And I was going to say, even add on to that, they had this huge impactful moment between him possibly bringing Hay over to his parents and saying, I don't care what you guys think. I love you, my parents, but I'm choosing her. That was probably a very significant moment for him if that happened, especially with how religious they were. And to think only two months later,

she's breaking up with him and he's going to be giving her a best friends frame when he sacrificed so much and put such a strain on his relationship with his parents for her. I tend to agree with you that there would probably be at minimum some resentment there that he risks so much for her to just have her be willing to end it. So yeah, I could see there is an angle. You know me, I'm always here to do the devil's advocate stuff, right? Always here to do the devil's work. Do the devil's work. And he just, he loves her. And if he can't have her from an intimate way, in an intimate way, he wants to still remain good friends with her because he values her friendship i mean

it's possible who are we to say it's not for sure it's possible it's just from the amount that from how how into her he seemed how like i mean he's driving over he's like sitting outside her basement window for hours talking her at night like to just be like, oh, she's broken up with me. And that's cool. I'm fine. I just want her to be happy. And we're best friends. It just seems like you need a little bit more time to sort of heal your hurt feelings.

Otherwise, maybe he thought it could it could go back to that by remaining best friends. He might be like, listen, she's not seeing anybody else at this moment, as he knows. No, I think he knew. I think he knew after she broke up with him in mid-December that she was kind of like talking about Don with him. Because when he met Don in the Lens Crafters parking lot on December 23rd, he said something like he would later talk about it to Sarah Koenig. And he was like, yeah, I just wanted, you know, I shook his hand and I said, I just want to make sure you're a good guy. So he definitely knew that not only did she break up with him, but she immediately was interested in someone else. Oh, you left that part out, Stephanie. Oh, sorry.

That's a big, significant part. A big thing, right? I'm thinking that they're both sitting in the parking lot with each other, not knowing that that's the ex and that's the new guy. No, they knew. Oh, well, yeah, that's pretty significant. That's an awkward moment yeah but according to um rabia shaudry you know adnan also i think at the beginning of january started seeing someone else although we don't really hear about her a lot you know going forward but we're

going to talk about that but i real quick real quick that's interesting though to your point that you said earlier now knowing that It would make me believe more so that if don is already at work With hey, he's already there because he's getting ready to leave, right? He would bring her home, right that he would bring her home or at minimum He would just go out to the parking lot and look at her car for her. Why would she also? Have her ex-boyfriend show up to look at the car It wouldn't not only would it not be a good situation potentially, but it's just kind of impractical Why would she also have her ex-boyfriend show up to look at the car?

Not only would it not be a good situation potentially, but it's just kind of impractical. You have a guy that you trust and you like here that can go out to the car and look before you leave. Or you can have your ex-boyfriend drive out to the mall to check it out. It's a redundancy. Yeah. Knowing all that, you have to make a call based on what I've told you. If that's true, then maybe Adnan just showed up on his own because I don't think she would have both of them go out there to inspect the vehicle. But maybe it was a miscommunication or something. But knowing that now that they kind of knew about each other and Adnan wanted to see if he was a good guy. Yeah, maybe. Maybe there was a little of uh he heard what he wanted to hear he heard but you know basically hay saying come come check out my car for me please or he was like hey this other guy's there and i want to let this other guy know that i'm still here and i'm still in the picture

and she doesn't really need you because i can tell her if her car is okay to drive and i can give her a ride home and that's what i was going to say just to defend adnan who'd she drive home with at none just saying just saying she could have said oh thanks adnan didn't really need you to show up or she could have felt like guilty that he drove all the way there and she wasn't going to be like well thanks take off you know and so she ended up going with him which was his plan the whole time team Team Adnan. I'm just kidding. Not there yet. Just saying. Just saying. No, I think this is such a weird thing, too, for us because we're trying to get in the

minds of teenagers, which we were once, like I was joking earlier, a long time ago. But why we do things when we're young and how we do them, a lot of the times it's very innocent. And it's just about growing and becoming an adult and making good decisions. And this could be something that's all very innocent and it's just about growing and becoming an adult and making good decisions. And this could be something that's all very innocent, but we're here kind of breaking it down because of the topic we're talking about. So we have to, but it is tough to get into the mind of a teenager. You have one that's already, what, she's 20 now, right? Yo, we don't need to talk about, she's 21'll be 21 this right this month next week but listen

speak for yourself man i'm still like i'm still innocent and immature in my head um i make really bad decisions all the time i'm very very spontaneous as you know but yeah i do no i mean we're just we're breaking down things here it does get tough to kind of get into the minds, but really interesting dynamic there. And considering the timeframe in which that took place and then the time that she was killed could be very important, could be just a red herring, but something to consider as we're going forward. Yeah. So like his supporters, anytime something like this happens, they're like, isn't he sweet? Where to me, I'm like, it's like too much. It's kind of creepy.

It's kind of like extra. It's kind of like I have no boundaries. To me, that's like anytime like isn't this sweet? You know, I'm like, I feel like it's a little it's a little weird. It's a little much. So it just depends how you look at it, I guess. Yeah. That's the best way to say it depends on how you want to look at it. There's a lot of bias there. We're trying to be objective, but even us, it's like you're, you're, you're hearing it and then we're judging him on our own experiences as teenagers. Yeah. So there's no other way to do it. You know, you have a set of lived experiences that you look at the world through and that's what we that's all we can do. So on January 2nd, Hay and Don finally had their first date and her shift away from being torn between Don and Adnan to being firmly focused on Don is once again represented in her diary with a full page of

Don's name. So before it was like a big Don and a big Adnan and she's like, who is it? Adnan or Don, Adnan or Don? And now it's just Don, Don. And by January 12th, Hay was head over heels writing, quote, I love you, Don. I think I may have found my soulmate. I love you so much. I fell in love with you the moment I opened my eyes to see you in the break room for the first time. End quote. And then the next day, Hayman Lee was dead. So that's a lot. She kept writing in her diary up until the day before she disappeared. And next week, we're going to go over the investigation

that kicked off when Hay was reported missing, and that will lead us to discussing the timelines of January 13. This is when it gets very convoluted. I'm not looking forward to it. The timelines are complicated. They're messy. We have eyewitnesses who claim to have seen something

or someone at specific times or on specific dates, and then they were later proved wrong or, you know, retracted their own statements. And we don't know if they just misremembered or if they were lying. And there's one specific person who ended up leading the police to the location of Hay, and the story that he told pointed an accusatory finger directly at Adnan Saeed. But Adnan's timeline is completely different than this person's timeline. And the cell phone data, which should have really cleared everything up, ended up being like everything else in this case.

Not so simple and very complicated. So that is where we will pick up next week. Fascinating. Fascinating case. I can see why people are enamored by it because on the surface, it looks like right now, just kind of to summarize our part one seems like adnan for the most part may have been someone who was a little um overbearing wanted to you know a little possessive

but overall a good guy just trying to find a balance between appeasing his parents and living his own life and overall from all accounts from all the people that knew him, smart, charismatic, nice guy. I mean, the guy won homecoming prince. So clearly he was someone who made a good impression on a lot of people. Prom prince. Oh, I apologize. I apologize. Prom prince.

Forgive me, Adnan. I'm sure that's something he would make sure he wants correct as we go as we go forward but he was definitely liked by a lot of people and in most cases that's because they're they're someone who's easy to get along with and and everyone finds that they are there's someone that they can relate to and that they can be around so on the surface nothing here that like pops off the page where I'm like, oh my god How are we here right now? This is you can already see where this wasn't one is going So I'm interested to hear more because now we're gonna get into the stuff That really starts to break down the case and I think where a lot of people have very strong opinions on how the investigation was

Conducted and that's really what this gets down to here. So looking forward to that, but there was no way we're at on the timer right now, we're at an hour and 50 minutes. There's no way to do any case without covering these types of details, because before you can go forward, you got to go back. And that's what we did. So now we have our foundation. Now we can start building a house. Definitely. And don't forget to join us next week. Also follow us on social media, Twitter and Instagram. Derek, what are the handles? Crime Weekly Pod for Twitter and Instagram. And our coffee company, which is called Criminal Coffee Company, is Drink Criminal on Twitter and Drink Criminal Coffee on Instagram. And those handles are right down below. As always,

we appreciate you joining us. Stay safe out there. We will see you next week. Bye.