Story and News podcasts are gaining popularity in this modern world.  Serial is finally back after a hiatus of nearly an entire year. The first season featured the compelling mystery of the murder of Hae Min Lee in Baltimore in 1999. Was her ex-boyfriend Adnan Syed the murderer? He was convicted and has been in prison for all these years, but there was never any physical evidence. Spoiler Alert- As a result of the podcast new information was uncovered and he has just now begun the process for a legitimate retrial.

Serial swept NPR listeners off their feet, hungering for more, and now our podcast has finally returned. This second season tells the story of Bowe Bergdahl an American soldier who walked off his base in Afghanistan and was captured by the Taliban and held prisoner for five years. He was released in exchange for five Taliban members that were being held by the US in Guantanamo Bay back in 2014, but is now finally on trial.

Bowe Bergdahl, a soldier in the US Army, was deployed to Afghanistan in May of 2009, according to CNN, and was captured June 30th. As he tells the story to Mark Boal, a Hollywood screenwriter, he didn’t just desert on purpose as some claim. Bergdahl claims that there was what he called, “a leadership failure;” his commanding officers were irresponsible and partook in practices that endangered the lives of their subordinates. So he devised a plan. He would pack up, and walk to the next base, which was at a few days walk. This disappearance would cause what is known as a DUSTWUN, duty status whereabouts unknown. The commotion that the DUSTWUN would cause would put him in deep trouble but win him an audience with government higher-ups that have influence to make changes to resolve the “leadership failure” and that couldn’t simply do nothing after the stunt he pulled. Unfortunately, it didn’t go as planned. He left in the middle of the night and made a bit of a detour and got lost. In the daylight, he stuck out of the barren terrain like a sore thumb and the Taliban rode up on motorcycles and picked him up off the side of the road. He thus began his next five years in Taliban captivity.

Bergdahl was moved a lot but his first move was from Afghanistan into Pakistan because if he was in Pakistan the US couldn’t go looking for him there.  In those next five years, he staged two successful escapes though neither was ultimately successful. The first lasted less than twenty minutes; the second lasted approximately nine days. Escaping though only made his conditions worse once he was recaptured. When talking to Mark Boal about being kept literally in the dark in a kind of basement he asks, “How do I explain to a person that standing in an empty, dark room hurts? … Yes, your body hurts. But it’s more than that. It’s like… you’re almost confused… I would wake up remembering…not even what I was.”  For part of his captivity he was even kept in a metal cage.  Torture like this and countless other inhumane deeds filled his five years in Taliban captivity.

Now Berdahl has been court martialed by General Robert Abrams, who is “the commander of the US Army Forces Command” according to CNN. One military officer recommended that Bergdahl face a special court martial and no jail time because of the five years he spent being tortured by the Haqqani network of the Taliban. Instead, though Abrams sent Bergdahl to a general court martial where he could possibly face life imprisonment. Bergdahl is being charged with misbehavior before the enemy by endangering the safety of a command, unit, or place. According to CNN, attorney Eugene Fidell who represents Bergdahl is disappointed in this recent development. The disappointment is rooted in the fact that both Lieutenant Colonel Mark Visger and Major General Kenneth Dahl are opposed to Bergdahl facing jail time. Maj. Gen. Dahl even testified last year in a preliminary hearing that it would be “inappropriate” for Bergdahl to face jail time as no evidence was ever found that he was “sympathetic to the Taliban.”

Soon, Bergdahl will get a court date and Serial will finish their story on him. It is an intriguing story, and it is worth your attention to uncover the ending. To find out what happens next and more details of the story, check out the Serial Podcast.