‘The Night Of’ finale: Looking at the Andrea Cornish killer suspects

Sunday night marks the season finale of “The Night Of” on HBO, and with that in mind we’re here to try and debate the question at the center of the series: Who killed Andrea Cornish? Naz may be the one on trial, but over the course of the season we’d argue that several other possible candidates have come to the surface. Some have been investigated, and others have not. Some have motives, while others are strictly creepy. It’s an interesting crew, and all of them are worthy of investigation in one way or another.

Nasir Khan – He is the main character of the series, and given that we’ve been led to think he is innocent the majority of the season, most signs point to that being the case. However, we’ve since learned that he has a little bit of a violent streak that stems back to his time in school, so who knows? Maybe when he was under the influence of drugs, that dangerous part of him came out and he snapped. It’s wrong to rule it out.

Trevor – He’s one of the guys who saw Naz and Andrea on the street, and taunted him for his ethnicity. Trevor has interviewed with the police, but left out a couple of key details: That he was with someone else in Duane Reade, and where he was heading that night. If he knew the neighborhood, maybe he was aware of some easy access points into Andrea’s home.

Duane Reade – He is the more likely suspect rather than Trevor, given that he seemed to be afraid enough of him to not suggest he was even there on the night. He also ran from John Stone, so clearly he’s got something to hide. Still, like Trevor, there are questions of motive unless they were all somehow linked via the drug trade.

Royal Day – The man who was driving the hearse that night, and eyed Andrea as a “cat” who was ready to destroy her prey. There’s obviously something terrible in this guy’s past that is causing him to have such an overtly misogynistic view towards many women, and it did appear that he followed Naz and Andrea out of the gas station. Yet, would he really kill her just because he thought she was a dangerous woman and harmful to someone he’s never even met?

Don Taylor – He’s Andrea’s stepfather, and someone who has the clearest motive to kill Andrea in that her death would give him her mother’s home. He’s got a history of trying to swindle older women, and he’s obviously very familiar with the place. With all of this being said, how did he know that this was the right night to kill Andrea? Was he waiting for someone else to pawn it off on?

Ray Halle – Could the CPA be involved somehow? We wonder whether or not he and Don plotted this together in order to split up some of her possessions, and maybe their fight at the funeral came about because Don decided to not fulfill his end of the bargain. That’s when Ray determined that he was fine to throw him under the bus. This is an interesting theory, but it feels like a little too much of a stretch since Don would obviously try to implicate him in some way.