Adnan Syed’s murder conviction was vacated on the 19^th of September in Maryland, undoubtedly with the help of a podcast named Serial from 2014.

Adnan Syed has spent more than 20 years in prison after being charged with the murder of his ex-girlfriend, Hae Min Lee, but new suspects and unreliable phone records have led new investigators to believe his case might not have been correctly investigated.

Sarah Koenig, owner of Serial, was able to shed worldwide attention on Syed’s case.

Kristen Cardwell, an English teacher in West Virginia said, “I first heard about Serial through an English teacher I follow on Instagram. I listened to it in hopes of using it in my classes, but ended up getting hooked on the content. I normally don’t even enjoy true crime, but this case was just too interesting to resist.”

Cardwell decided to include this case in her classes and every year draws in more people to the case. Without this podcast, it is likely many people would have no idea about Hae’s murder and the possibility of a bizarre false conviction.

“There are definitely some sketchy things that appear to make him seem like a possible suspect but not a definite murderer. Jays ever-changing testimony and the cell phone pings not being accurate alone are enough to tell me that the case was hacked by both the prosecution and Adnan’s attorney. She should’ve reached out to the girl from the library. Also, with the fact that the detective that questioned jay later got caught fabricating evidence, I can’t see how anyone can truly think Adnan wasn’t set up in a least some ways,” she said.