Chundry?

Listening to the podcast, I couldn't make up my mind about whether I thought hew was guilty or innocent. But it was clear as hell that his attorney was ineffective. This is a good decision.

I believe Adnan was guilty as hell. For a number of reasons. Think about it. His very recently ex-girlfriend - she left him for another guy - whom he claims he had an amicable split from - he claims they are still friends and that he has no ill will at all ... suddenly goes missing. Days and weeks pass. All of her actual friends and family are naturally flipping out. One of the things that ALL of them did is call her cell. Repeatedly. Of course they did. If you don't know what's happened to someone who has suddenly disappeared without a word, having no idea where they may have gone or what has happened to them, one of the only things you CAN do is call them on their cell and leave a message. In case they have, perhaps, run away. In case they are depressed and upset. You call in case they might just pick up this time.

Adnan, unlike everyone else who knew her, never called her. He admitted to this, and it's documented by cell records. This makes no sense at all, right? Why does he care so little to find out what the deal is, if everyone else does? His excuse was that he figured she'd taken off to California to visit her uncle (I think it was her uncle, or some relative). None of the other people in the girl's life were satisfied with the notion that she would up and leave without telling anyone, and make zero contact with anyone for the whole time she was "gone", right? Because it makes no sense.

What makes sense is that Adnan didn't call her because he knew she dead.

What also makes sense is that he felt that had the justification to kill her, the "incentive" that so many of the hundreds of men who kill their former or present female intimate partners do - one only need check out the horrifying statistics, there: She had split up with him and gone with another guy. Men routinely kill their intimate female partners and ex parters every day over less. These are straight up facts.

Thirdly, remember that he came from a traditional Muslim family. He was not supposed to be seeing a girl at all, let alone sleeping with her. Marjor, serious violation. His family found out. His parents even burst into the prom where Adnan and the girl (I can't remember her name) had gone together. His mother made a huge public scene at the prom ... blaming the girl, instead of her precious "innocent" son ... for what she was "doing to the family". She said to her, out loud in front of the whole prom: "look what you're doing to our family!"

What sort of leap would it be to believe that his mother's very emotional public statement that the girl herself was at fault for apparently in her mind, poisoning her son's purity, or whatever ...to this being Adnan's view? Does anyone need to be reminded of the status of women in Muslim societies? A violation of a man's reputation, or of his family at the hands of a female who has to boot, caused him to be tempted to and to repeatedly have sex with her outside of marriage is gigantic. And guess who gets blamed if this happens? Never the men. Why do you think burquas exist? To cover female bodies head to toe to avoid men feeling any temptation at all - so bewitching is a wrist, an ankle, a forehead, or a fucking lock of hair.

That the podcast chose not to mention the very relevent male-on-intimate-female-partner violence and murder stats in the US and elsewhere is a huge breach to say the least. Huge.

Then you have the guy who says he helped Adnon bury the girl's body. The guy is NOT someone that the police believe killed her. So why would this guy come forward and tell this tale if it wasn't true? It again, makes no sense. He tells a very detailed account of Adnan having admitted to having strangled the girl in a car. He then needs help burying her and threatens and coerces the guy into helping him do so. When the podcast tracks this guy down, all he can tell them is of his disgust w/Adnan for refusing to admit the truth all these years, that he killed her.

It was highly frustrating that the host of the podcast decided that any mention of the role of Adnan's family's religion was "racist", and therefore, to apparently instantly be discounted. That coupled with her many many hours of interviews with a guy who is articulate and intelligent and comes off like a nice, normal guy, I believe certainly contributed to the host believing he was innocent. As if! As if murderers and criminals don't have a long and notorious history of being able to turn on the "charm" when it serves them. That she somehow sees the fact that he has maintained his innocence while in prison as further reason to believe him is beyond laughable and another example of refusing to consider the role the traditional religious background he stems from plays. In other words, there is no possible way he would bring that sort of shame down on his family by admitting to the murder. That she wouldn't even consider this is just bizarre. Another huge breach.

All told, the guy has served his time in prison, probably the same amount he would have served had he confessed to the truth that he killed her in a rage. So I guess I don't see the what the celebrating is about.

Another thing that I found horrendous was that the podcast didn't seem to care about nor consider the intense pain they had to be inflicting on the dead girl's famliy in broadcasting Adnan's breezy observations every episode, and clearly, ultimately, championing him in helping to make people doubt the guilty verdict. Just unreal.