Serial: S03 Episode 04: A Bird in Jail Is Worth Two on the Street

October 4, 2018 7:43 AM

This episode deals with two separate murders of young children in Cleveland. It’s not an easy listen.

There is very little about the Justice Center, though it makes an appearance, but Koenig and crew focus on the breakdown of relations between police and the community.

posted by Kattullus (4 comments total)

I was listening to this in a café and had to pause it twice to get napkins. The second time because I had used up all of the first napkin. Surreally Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On?” was playing in the café.

I had meant to take a half-hour break, listen for a little while and then get back to work, but after they played the court testimony I wasn’t going to be able to focus so I finished the episode in one go.

Usually episodes in this season of Serial have left me angry, but this one... I just feel wrung out.
posted by Kattullus at 7:54 AM on October 4, 2018

There is very little about the Justice Center

Felt a little bit as though SK may have started from this story (there's more to come in the next ep), as an indepth on street-vs-state justice, and then developed the one-season-in-one-courthouse concept from there.
posted by progosk at 11:37 AM on October 4, 2018

there's more to come in the next ep

Maybe not the way you think. The way the previous one ended, I expected this week to be a continuation of the case of the guy arrested in the hallway for no reason, where one of the cops subsequently got caught on video beating up a black arrestee. So I think Koenig's similarly cryptic "next time" at the end of this might again just be pointing to a new case that will explain more of what she means by "detective work, but not by detectives."
posted by dnash at 4:53 PM on October 4, 2018 [2 favorites]

The whole "no snitching," street justice code thing.... I couldn't help but think of Aeschylus's "Oresteia," the whole theme of which is the breaking of the endless cycle of revenge killing (street justice) through the institution of trial by jury.

But hey, y'know, kids don't need to study humanities in school, right?
posted by dnash at 5:05 PM on October 4, 2018 [3 favorites]