[0:00]On January 13th, 1999, 18-year-old high school student Hae Min Lee was seen leaving Woodlawn High School in her 1998 Nissan Sentra at 2:15 p.m. She was on her way to pick up her younger cousin from daycare before heading to her after-school job at a Lenscrafters optical shop. She was supposed to arrive at 3:15 p.m., but she never showed. This was highly unusual for someone as responsible and conscientious as Hae Min Lee, alerting her family that something was wrong. Hae's family quickly called the police who responded by conducting a search and talking to her various friends. They reached out to her ex-boyfriend Adnan Syed around 6:30 p.m. He said that the last time he had seen her was in school when classes ended. The police were also able to get in touch with her current boyfriend Don, who was her co-worker at Lenscrafters. Many assumed that she had met him, but he didn't know where she was either. No one did. Four weeks later on February 9th, a man working at a local community college stops by Leakin Park to relieve himself. He walked a bit further from the road to find a good spot and ended up finding Hae's body which was partially buried in a shallow grave. The area was known as a place where bodies are buried. The autopsy results showed that Hae died from manual strangulation. The police investigated the man who found her, Alonzo Sellers. They also checked out Don, the new boyfriend. They didn't find anything. Then they received an anonymous tip asking them to investigate Adnan Syed. After the police got the tip about Adnan, they pulled his cell phone records and began to look at the people he talked to that day. One of the names that came up was Jennifer Pusateri. When the police talked to her initially, Jennifer didn't have much to say. However, she shows up at the station the day after with her lawyer. During Jennifer's interview, she stated that Adnan was with Jay on that fateful day. More importantly, she revealed that Adnan had killed Hae, according to Jay. Jay was then invited to the police for an interview. He admits that he was with Adnan on January 13, he helped Adnan bury the body. And to prove his testimony, he led the police to where Hae's car was parked. At this point, the police had yet to discover her car. Around six weeks after she went missing, the police arrested him. The evidence disclosed at the trial included a testimony from his friend Jay Wilds, who claimed to have assisted Adnan in burying Hae, as well as cell tower records that show that he was near Leakin Park that night. A year later, Adnan was convicted of murder, robbery, kidnapping and false imprisonment. He was sentenced to life in prison plus 30 years. In 2014, a podcast called Serial started by Sarah Koenig, which questioned Syed's guilt. In a span of 12 episodes, Serial presented the public with a case of wrongful conviction. Syed was innocent, according to Koenig and her team, there was no evidence to support his guilt. The podcast became very popular. In fact, the case became internationally famous. The show also allowed other to start digging more into the case, unearthing information that gave birth to theories on who really killed Hae Min Lee. The theories. Let's put aside Adnan as the murderer for now, and look at the different theories that sprouted after Serial came out. If Adnan isn't guilty, then who killed Hae Min Lee? Some proposed that it was Jay who killed Hae and placed the blame on Adnan. He gave details about the murder and the disposal of the body. While he testified as an accessory after the fact, he could have been the murderer. Moreover, he kept changing his testimony which led people to doubt him. As for motive, some have suggested it was because Hae threatened to report him to the police that he was dealing drugs. Others said that it might have been because Hae caught him cheating on his girlfriend, Stephanie. In any case, Jay needed to shut Hae up, so he killed her. Unfortunately for the proponents of this theory, there is no evidence to prove that Jay is the guilty party. If Hae had actually caught him cheating, wouldn't she tell Adnan about it first? He was, after all, Stephanie's best friend. But she doesn't do that. There's not even any mention of it in her diary. More importantly, Hae wasn't close with Jay. It's unlikely that she would meet him alone, somewhere where he could kill her unnoticed. Like the Jay is the killer theory, there wasn't any evidence to support this one. While some suspected Jay, others felt that Don, Hae's current boyfriend at that time, was a strong suspect in her murder.
[6:16]At the time Lee went missing, it was determined that Don had an alibi. He was at a Lenscrafter's store in Hunt Valley from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. that day. The general manager confirmed his alibi. He even had a time sheet to prove it. However, it turned out that the time sheet he used had a different employee number. Plus, the manager of the store where he was at the time, was his mother's girlfriend. Moreover, the police were unable to reach him until 1:30 a.m. on the night Lee went missing. He claimed that he was home around 7 p.m. So, why didn't he call the police back? Despite these red flags, the police didn't seem to be interested in Don as a suspect. Moreover, there isn't any physical evidence linking him to the murder. As for motive, some people think that he may have thought that Hae still had feelings for Syed and became overly jealous. But Lee's last diary entry where she professes her love for Don doesn't support that fact. She even included her love for Don in her AOL profile for everyone, including Adnan, to see. Some people suspect that it was Mr. S, the man who found Hae's body, who was the murderer. According to his statement, he discovered Hae's body on his way to get a tool from his house. He stopped by the side of the road to pee and the spot he chose, 143 feet from the road, just happened to be near her. It doesn't sound suspicious until you learn that Mr. S has a criminal record. Then again, his record, which includes compulsive streaking, does not indicate that he would be capable of murdering a random teenage girl. He was given two polygraph tests. He failed the first one and then aced the second one. Experts state that this doesn't exactly scream guilt. He could have just been naturally nervous. Furthermore, it doesn't make sense for the murderer to lead the police to the body of his victim. More importantly, he doesn't really have a motive for doing so. One Reddit user found another alternative suspect, Roy S. Davis III. Just a few months before Lee's body was found, the body of 18-year-old Jada Lambert was discovered in a wooded park. She was also a student at Woodlawn High School. DNA tests conducted in 2002 proved that her killer was Roy Davis. There were several similarities between the two cases which led people to speculate that Roy might have also murdered Hae. Jada was also last seen driving her car. She was also strangled and left in a wooded area. It is possible that both girls drove past Liberty Road where Roy used to live. In fact, Roy's house was quite close to the Campfield Early Learning Center where Hae's cousin was waiting to be picked up. However, Hae wasn't raped. She was also fully clothed. Aside from a few similarities, there's no evidence that even links Roy to the crime. A convicted serial burglar Ronald Lee Moore is also a candidate for Hae's murder. He was released from prison just 10 days before Hae disappeared. In 2013, he was suspected of killing Annelise Hyang Suk Lee, who was found murdered in her apartment in Maryland in 1999, the same year that Hae was murdered. It was the podcast Serial that first suggested Moore as a plausible suspect.
[9:52]However, Moore was investigated by the police and his DNA was checked against the DNA found at the crime scene. It didn't match. In 2020, Moore was identified as the murderer of Shawn Marie Neal, who was found strangled in her condo in North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina in 1996. It was DNA that linked him to the murder. Unfortunately, Moore committed in jail in 2018. More importantly, there is still nothing that connects him to Hae Min Lee. Even with so many theories around, there's only one party that stands out, Adnan Syed. He had the motive, means, and opportunity, the grand trifecta. Plus, he has holes in his alibi. But that's just the half of it. The second half of the question is, was this murder premeditated? We certainly think so. Adnan already felt murderous rage well before the 13th.
[11:59]He made sure that he could meet her alone that day by leaving his car with Jay. If Adnan just planned to meet Hae alone and get her back, then why did he need to leave his phone and car with Jay? Why didn't he leave his car in school or some parking lot? Having Jay at his beck and call was all part of the plan. He went to school that day knowing that if Hae didn't choose to come back to him, he would kill her. And Jay would help him bury the body. When did he start planning? Maybe sometime during the week after he saw Hae's updated AOL profile. At the very least, Jay knew of the plan the day before. He may have believed it or not. He may have been just going along with Adnan, indulging him to help him vent his anger. But things got real. He got the call and he went to Best Buy. Many say that Jay had been coached by the police to frame Adnan. If Jay had been a victim of a police frame job, he could have recanted his testimony when Serial came out. He could have confessed that his story was a lie. He could have cleared his name and even earned money selling his story. But he didn't. Jay admitted what he did wrong. He may have tried to minimize his involvement. We all do that. It's been more than 20 years since the murder and the conviction of Adnan Syed. He was released in 2022 and his life sentence vacated. The Supreme Court of Maryland reinstated his conviction because Hae's family was not given appropriate notice. However, it hasn't been decided yet whether Adnan will be put back in prison. While waiting for the Supreme Court's decision, Adnan has requested the Maryland Attorney General to investigate prosecutorial misconduct in his conviction. What most likely happened. Now, we must admit that some parts of our most likely happened scenario can be considered as assumptions. But it's Occam's Razor. The simplest explanation that fits the evidence is that Adnan planned to kill Hae if she didn't get back together with him. Since she said no, he proceeded with the plan and killed her sometime between 2:40 and 3:30 p.m. Then he got help establishing his planned alibi and dumping her body in Leakin Park. Let's hope that the courts will agree. If you love our content and want to support the channel, feel free to check out our web shop where you can find exclusive true crime merch brought to you by bad things.
