The ethics of Serial and true crime entertainment

Release of Adnan Syed has reignited debate over the role of the genre

Serial host Sarah Koenig
Serial host Sarah Koenig has been criticised in the past
(Image credit: Jessica Rinaldi/Getty Images)

The release from jail this week of Adnan Syed, whose murder conviction 23 years ago gained notoriety via the popular podcast Serial, has reignited the debate over the ethics of true crime entertainment.

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Jamie Timson is the UK news editor, curating The Week UK's daily morning newsletter and setting the agenda for the day's news output. He was first a member of the team from 2015 to 2019, progressing from intern to senior staff writer, and then rejoined in September 2022. As a founding panellist on “The Week Unwrapped” podcast, he has discussed politics, foreign affairs and conspiracy theories, sometimes separately, sometimes all at once. In between working at The Week, Jamie was a senior press officer at the Department for Transport, with a penchant for crisis communications, working on Brexit, the response to Covid-19 and HS2, among others.