Confessions of a Serial Alibi (8 page)

CHAPTER THREE

2010

During the spring of 2010, a lot was going on in my life. My husband Phillip and I had been recently married and we were adjusting to sharing our lives together. I was adjusting to life as stay-at-home wife and business owner. There were many personal and financial issues at play within our household. At the time we were living in a beautiful 1,600-square foot, three-story townhouse in the Lions Gate community, located in Hillsboro, Oregon. Money was a little tight because of the one-income situation and I had been having some extremely stressful health issues as a result of my battle with Ulcerative Colitis. To make matters worse, my husband and I were in the midst of finding new employers so that we could move over 365 miles to another state, in order to start our family and be closer to my husband’s family. Neither of us had close relatives in Oregon so having family nearby was our most viable option for having kids. As I always say, “You got to go where the babysitters are!”

In addition to all of this stress, we were also in the midst of trying to build our own business and planning our (delayed) wedding ceremony in July of that year. All in all, our life together was at a major crossroads and we were going through some major life events, which are all known to measure pretty high on the Holmes and Rahe Stress Scale. I say this not to make excuses for my actions, rather to paint a more accurate view of my life in 2010 so it can be better understood. Nevertheless, things were touchy but overall I considered my life with Phillip to be pretty blessed. I still do. One thing that made the stress all worth it was that I was in love with a man who absolutely adored me (and still does) and we were hand-in-hand embarking on the journey of our lives. Like I said before, I’ve had my share of negative relationships. For the first time there were no unhealthy friendships in my life nor were there any hints of drama that often accompanies such people. So when the private investigator showed up looking for me, it was an unpleasant reminder of the type of drama that I had worked so hard to eliminate in my life. All in all, it was not a far stretch to say that I was downright rattled by the investigator’s presence outside of my home.

It was a normal day by all accounts and my husband was away for a business meeting. I was upstairs on the third floor of the townhome doing laundry. As it has been since explained to me, my husband pulled his blue Honda Accord into the driveway and proceeded to walk up to the house when he was stopped by a female stranger. After introducing herself the investigator explained that she was looking for a young woman by the name of Asia McClain, in reference to a trial from 2000. According to my husband, his hands were overloaded with materials from his car, so he politely asked to be excused for a moment, in order to “put down his belongings.” He quickly came inside and by this time I was on the second floor of the townhome in the kitchen. He quickly ran up the stairs to where I was now sitting on the couch. As he gasped for air he said, “Hey babe, there’s a private investigator outside asking for you by your maiden name. I think it’s about that girl that got murdered when you were in high school.” As soon as I heard those words vacate his mouth and saw the perplexing look on his face, I felt a rush of adrenaline shoot through my body. Perhaps it was hearing him say the words “murdered” or “private investigator” but I freaked out. By this point in my life, I’d had my fair share of negative experiences with people “finding me.” Some of these included people who often tried to follow me home (years before) in order to steal my sports car and an ex-boyfriend who had trouble letting go. So a strange person showing up at my house rudely (said my husband) and spouting off words like “murder” didn’t exactly stimulate immediate reciprocity from me.

“What?!” I said. A flood of thoughts raced through my head. How did they find where I lived? The Internet was by no means as awesome as it is now. Plus, I was newly married (with a new name) and I had not yet been added to our townhouse lease. What did they want from me? As far as I knew Adnan was presumably in jail. It had already been ten years. What on earth did I have to offer now? Why bother sending someone across the country to look for little old me? Wait...who were “they?” Was this person really working for the lawyer or was it Adnan or perhaps someone else? Was this person going to report back to whoever their employer was with my information, if they were able to confirm my location? Was I in danger? Like I said before, I have a very active imagination, so these are just some of the panicking thoughts I had.

“No way. What!? He’s still in jail, right?” I said and my husband shrugged his shoulders. The first thing that came to my head was “I’m not here!”

I then told my husband to tell the investigator that he knew me but that I did not indeed live there anymore. I also told him to get her contact information and say that he would get it to me. So like a good husband that’s exactly what he did. It wasn’t until the investigator got snarky and rude with him (probably because she knew he was lying) did he have more to say. It was at this time that he belted back, “Given what I know about the case, sounds like the guy did it,” and shut the door in the investigators face. Never mind that my husband and I actually had no factual knowledge about the case. All my husband knew were things that I had told him. All I knew were rumors that I had heard back in high school. It had been some time since I had even spoken about the tragedy with anyone else. I hardly ever spoke of it in terms of Adnan, rather that it was simply the tragedy of the nice Asian girl who was murdered during my senior year of high school, occasionally adding in the fact that I may have talked to the guy who killed her on the same day he did it. Most people never asked details at that point in the conversation and if they did I would always say something like how crazy it was because he always seemed so nice.

After the encounter with the investigator it’s fair to say that I was shaken and a bit in shock. The investigator had left my husband with a business card for defense attorney Justin Brown. After the investigator was gone, I simply sat on the couch staring at Brown’s business card for what seemed like ten minutes. As I stared, I began to wonder more and more about the murder that occurred eleven years before. This Justin Brown character had apparently gone through a lot of trouble to track me down. I had lived in three different states since my days at Woodlawn High School. How did the investigator find me? I had not had my own lease since I came to the state in 2005. Since that time, I always had a sublet. I didn’t have a criminal past, my Myspace was private and none of my family or friends had been spoken to (to my knowledge). What the hell was going on?
That was ten years ago,
I thought.
Did Adnan do it?
Again I found my head swarming with questions. The more that I thought about it, the more it became clear to me that I was going to need some answers in order to have some peace of mind.

By this time my husband had left the house again and I was alone. The thought of contacting Justin directly stressed me out and seemed like a bad idea. I wasn’t very knowledgeable about criminal court or lawyers, but I assumed that Brown would simply try and convince me to do what was right for his client and not what was morally right. Considering that I had been under the assumption that Adnan had received a fair trial, I assumed that Brown was the attorney of a convicted murderer. From a naïve perspective, defense attorneys are supposed to be the people who represent the bad guys. They are thought of as the ones who lie, cheat the system and do whatever is necessary to win their cases. I wasn’t so sure I wanted to take my lead from one of the bad guys. Also, as I stated in the SERIAL podcast, the idea of a convicted murderer (his associates, family or friends) knowing where you live is pretty unsettling, so I didn’t want to confirm that I actually had been located. Although Adnan’s family had never given me any reason to fear them, it was a pretty intense feeling knowing that they had spent a lot of money to send someone to the other side of the country to find me. Blame it on years of watching television and movies, but I feared that my lack of cooperation might not be received too well by whoever was stuck with that bill. I had not made my final decision on the matter but I did decide that I needed to do a little more homework before volunteering to get involved all willy-nilly.

First thing I did was I take to the Internet. First I looked up Justin Brown and checked out his credentials. I then made a phone call to my Washington cousin-in-law who works as an attorney to ask him questions. He was working, but I spoke to his wife and she said that unfortunately with me living in Oregon, I was at a loss for accurate legal advice. I was told that I should contact a Maryland attorney. Makes sense, right? Knowing that our income was limited at the time and that I could not afford to retain an attorney, I then called my grandfather to see if he knew of a lawyer that would answer my questions “pro bono.” As par for the course I got the attorney’s voicemail and was left back at square one, still clueless as ever and feeling more panicked by the minute. That’s when I got the idea to look up the original case prosecutor. I figured if anyone would give me the truth and not mislead me, it would be that person, aka “The Good Guy.” After all, Urick was there at the trial, right?! I then skimmed through an old online news article about the case, and that’s when I came across the name Kevin Urick. At that point I did an Internet search for Kevin Urick in Maryland and found several numbers that seemed promising. Luckily for me it only took a few tries and I was on the phone with Urick in no time.

The Kevin Urick Call

When I called Kevin Urick, I was immediately taken aback because he answered the phone (not a secretary). I knew that he would most likely not know who I was. It had been ten years since the trial and considering that I was never involved with it, there would be no way for him to recognize my name. That being my assumption, I introduced myself and told him about seeing Adnan Syed in the Woodlawn Public Library on January 13th, 1999. I told him that I was concerned because an investigator had just shown up at my house in Oregon and the visit had raised some concerns. I told him that I had signed a statement in reference to January 13th back in 2000 and wanted to know if he had any idea what was going on currently with the case. I also wanted his professional opinion on what the ramifications of signing the document in 2000 might be. I wanted to know if he was familiar with the type of document and if I could be subpoenaed because of it. I explained to him that at the time of writing the statement I was only seventeen and wanted to know if that statement might have anything to do with Mr. Brown’s reasoning for reaching out to me now. It’s at that moment that Mr. Urick placed me on a brief hold in order to “check his computer system” as he put it.

After waiting for what seemed like less than a minute Mr. Urick informed me that there were no open cases for Adnan Syed. He said that there was nothing that he could see from his end. It was at this point that he put great emphasis on the fact that normally he wouldn’t talk to someone like me but that legally it was okay because he was no longer the prosecutor handling the Syed case. Hearing that felt great to me, because it was at that very moment that I assumed I was about to be stone-walled. I didn’t know that when I called Urick, he was no longer tied to the Syed case. I naturally assumed he would direct me to obtaining my own attorney just like everyone else had. To hear that he was no longer the prosecutor and that he was actually about to open up about it was both a tremendous surprise and a relief.

Now, I am aware of the controversy surrounding this conversation with Kevin Urick. I am aware that I have been accused of recanting the story behind my original affidavit. I’m also aware of the testimony that Mr. Urick gave in which he stated I informed him of being pressured by the Syed family. I cannot recall every exact word that came out of my mouth during my conversation with Mr. Urick but what I can tell you is what I testified to is true. I don’t know what that man thinks he heard or if he has other motivations for testifying the way he did. All I can attest to is the intent of my call, what was told to me in response and what that response heavily influenced me to do. I’m not here to play he said, she said. You can look at the information yourself and come to your own rational conclusions. If any legal reprimands come his way as a result, they’re not coming from me. I think having everyone know the entire story and seeing the evidence of what I was told is satisfying enough for me.

In any case, my intentions for calling him were pretty simple and straightforward. They were never to recant my affidavit or my letters to Adnan. My intentions were never to inform him that the Syed family pressured me into doing anything. If you’ve made that assumption based on Urick’s 2010 testimony, I’d have to say you’ve been duped. I recently asked my attorney how the hell he was even allowed to testify to that “nonsense” as I put it. To me it would seem like hearsay. Unfortunately, as it was explained to me, a post-conviction hearing is very different from a trial. There is a lot more leeway given to both parties and most of what is typically discussed in those hearings tends to be a lot of hearsay. Makes no sense to me but it is what it is, I suppose. In any case the remainder of my conversation with Kevin Urick was also pretty simple and straightforward. Urick told me that since he didn’t see any open cases for Syed, that most likely his lawyer was preparing to file an appeal. He said since Mr. Syed was serving a life sentence and because of the fact that the conviction had almost reached ten years of age they were probably trying to put a last effort together to appeal before May 10th of that year. Urick also said that, most likely, the defense was getting close to exhausting all of their appeals and that they were probably trying to use me in conjunction with other things, as an effort to get a final appeal. This intrigued me and considering that he was giving me straightforward answers, my questions began to flow. Unfortunately for me this next part is a little fuzzy only because I don’t remember if it was I that brought up Cristina Gutierrez or if it was Kevin Urick. Nevertheless, Urick told me that Justin Brown was full of bullshit if his claim was that Cristina Gutierrez was incompetent due to her health issues. He told me that she was one of the best lawyers in Maryland and that anything alluding to her incompetence was nonsense. Being that, at the time, I had no knowledge of Gutierrez’s multiple sclerosis or her disbarment, I completely believed Urick. I mean after all it sounds reasonable that a defense lawyer would do and say anything to get his client out of prison, right? I then told Urick that I had not followed the original trial and asked him what happened. I specifically asked him about what led to Syed’s conviction. Urick then happily began to discuss the details of the trial to me. Urick told me that Adnan’s fingerprints were in Hae’s car and there was DNA recovered at the crime scene (which I was not asked about during my testimony because it wasn’t written in my “Urick Notes”). That later pissed me off in 2015 because I came to find out that it was Adnan’s palm print on an atlas in the car and not just general fingerprints everywhere. Back then we didn’t have GPS. Everyone used atlases and it would be no surprise to find Adnan’s prints on Hae’s atlas. I was also angry because I learned that the DNA collected at the crime scene was never tested. So we have no idea whether it belonged to Adnan or not.