After ‘Serial,’ thousands continue to ardently follow the case of Adnan Syed

Melissa Binkley first learned of Hae Min Lee’s killing from local news media, shortly after the 18-year-old’s body was found in Baltimore’s Leakin Park in 1999. The Lancaster County resident was struck by the tragic details — the conviction of her ex-boyfriend Adnan Syed for her murder, a grieving high school — but didn’t delve into the case herself until years later, when she first saw Sarah Koenig discussing her podcast “Serial” on television. “I thought, ‘Podcast? What’s a podcast?’ ” she remembered. “And then it just exploded.” The 2014 blockbuster of a podcast, when the medium was still novel, made Lee, Syed and Koenig herself household names.