Hae Min Lee Essay

There was a cold and brutal murder that involved the strangulation of an innocent girl awaiting her own high school graduation, Hae Min Lee, on January 13, 1999. She was only 17 at the time, with a bright future ahead; good grades, involved in many school activities, responsible, and well-known by many. Only a senior at her school, in a small town in Baltimore, Maryland, she was found dead at Leakin Park, only a few miles away from Woodlawn high school, where she attended until her murder. About 18 years later, her brutal death is still a mystery, and the true question is, who really killed Hae Min Lee and what was their motive? Jay Wilds is guilty of Hae Min Lee’s murder, another student at Woodlawn High School, committed on January 13,

1999. Adnan is currently in jail, and has been serving jail-time for more than 15 years, since March of 1999, when he was found guilty for Hae Min Lee’s murder. There is not much evidence to support that he is guilty; the police relied mostly on Jay Wilds’ testimonies, Adnan’s cell phone records, and how close friends/acquaintances viewed Adnan as a person. The police and many others believed Adnan had a motive for committing the murder, which was to get back at Hae Min Lee for ruining his reputation and breaking up with him. I am able to prove that Jay is guilty of Lee’s murder through the following: Jay Wilds changed his testimonies too often-they are not a reliable source; Kevin Urick finds attorney for Jay Wilds; tapping during police interviews; the reward money; the cellphone records don’t match up his story at times; they are not a reliable source; and Adnan’s alibi at the time of murder; proves that Jay might be lying. Jay Wilds, an acquaintance of Adnan, who based on his testimonies put Adnan in jail, changed his story many times; the police never bothered to question this.
The police relied on him more than anything to solve the case of who murdered Hae Min Lee, but did they ever bother to think that maybe he wasn’t telling all of the truth?

According to Sarah Koenig, creator of Serial, a podcast created to spread some insight on Lee’s murder, she argues that, “...Then there are more significant changes, but, still, you chalk them up to Jay trying to protect his friends – or trying to protect himself. In the first taped interview, Jay says they're grabbing some food at a restaurant when Officer Adcock calls Adnon asking if he's seen Hae. The next time he tells it, he says that when that call comes, they're at a friend's apartment – a friend whose father happens to be a homicide detective in another county. Jay tells the cops he'd actually been to her house three different times that day, but he didn't want to get her in trouble. In the first taped statement, Jay says he refused to help dig a grave for Hae. Two weeks later, he says they both dug the hole. But then, there are other changes – bigger changes – where it's harder to judge why the details shift. This one, for instance: In the first taped interview, Jay says Adnan only told him that same day that he was going to kill Hae. Two weeks later, Jay says that Adnan had started talking about it beforehand – four or five days before.” This quote supports my claim because it proves that Jay has lied on many times on where he was on January 13, 1999, and these significant/insignificant changes

prove that. His story is not credible, yet this is what the police mostly relied on to prove that Adnan was guilty, not Jay. Even though his testimony had changed many times, where Sarah mentions in an episode that there were too many testimonies, too many times to count, this was still what the cops and many others viewed as credible and substantial evidence. “People lie in court under oath all the time. Witnesses lie. Lawyers lie. Police lie. This should come as a shocker to no one. I’m not saying that’s what happened here, I’m just saying that I’m not assuming that everyone who participated in Adnan’s trial told the truth. But clearly the jury found Jay believable, or believable enough. After a six week trial, they convicted Adnan in just two hours. We talked to six jurors and none of them had any lingering doubts about the case. None of them wondered if the investigation was shoddy. None of them were much bothered by how Jay’s statements to police had shifted over time. So am I wrong to be hung up on that?” (Sarah Koenig, Episode 8). Furthermore, these changes in significant information, which the police seemed to not question at all, and have Sarah questioning many things and puzzled, as I am too, are only a small part of the evidence of why Jay is guilty of Hae Min Lee’s murder. Before the first trial against Adnan Syed in the murder of Hae Min Lee, Adnan’s own prosecutor, Urick, was able to hire an attorney for Wilds, which is something not heard of. Why would he help Wilds get an attorney if he was on Adnan’s side?
Kevin Urick, a prosecutor on Adnan’s team/group of those fighting for his innocence, decides to help Jay Wilds find a pro-bono attorney, which is something that had never been head of before; this is something Christina Gutierrez, Adnan’s former Lawyer who later died a couple years after the last trial, pointed out in the case against Jay Wilds.

Sarah Koenig states, “So Jay says the next thing that happens is the cops come to see him, on September 6, and tell him he’s about to be charged with accessory after the fact and that he’ll be able to get a lawyer. The next day, September 7, they come pick him up, they book him, and they take him to the State Attorney’s office. He meets Kevin Urick, the prosecutor. Jay says he’s never met Urick before and then he says Urick introduces him to Anne Benaroya, who can represent him for free. Jay and Benaroya talk privately for a while, and then they sign a plea agreement. Then, that same day, they all go across the street to the courthouse and present the signed plea to a judge. If you or a loved one is an attorney, your jaw is hanging open right now, correct? Prosecutors do not find attorneys for witnesses they are prosecuting. That is not a thing. A former prosecutor that worked in the Baltimore office at the time said she’s never heard of anything like that happening before. It sounded very strange to her, hence Gutierrez’s freak out” (Episode 10). The fact that a prosecutor, specifically Kevin Urick, was able to help aide Jay in

helping find an attorney, a witness he is prosecuting, definitely seems a bit suspicious. First, the police don’t seem to question Jay’s different versions and when some things are a little “off,” or when something like this happens, they don’t think much of it. The point that I’m trying to come across here is that the police never seemed to question Jay in the first place, but why are there so many things that just don’t add up? There seems to be a lot more to the whole story, and there is something that Jay was hiding; he was not credible enough to begin with, and he even admitted to the police and Christina Gutierrez that he lied in the police interviews about his location and other significant pieces of evidence because he was “associated.” However, he was already involved to begin with. According to Sarah, “Prosecutor Kevin Urick tells the judge he’s thoroughly pleased with Jay’s participation in the case and impressed” (Episode 8). Kevin Urick states, “--as I said very satisfactory and I believe honestly testified and also I would say something you don’t usually see I think he actually showed remorse during-- I saw real remorse on his part so I’d be happy to make that recommendation on his--.” Along the same lines, there are other bits-and-pieces of information, which may have not seemed big to the police or investigators, that also wave a big red flag for Jay, regarding his innocence. The next piece of evidence is the tapping during police interviews with Jay, which is an indication that the police may have been involved with some of his answers to hear what they wanted to hear.