Jay Wilds, a key figure from Serial podcast, has accused creator Sarah Koenig of creating “an evil archetype” of him and “sensationalizing” the case at the centre of the series.

With hundreds of thousands of weekly listeners, the popular podcast revisited the 1999 murder of American teenager Hae Min Lee.

Koenig spent the majority of the first season questioning the guilt of Adnan Syed, the young man charged with Lee’s murder, and revisiting testimoney from the 2000 trial.

• Why Serial is nothing more than just a good story

Wilds, who refused to speak to Koenig for the duration of the series, has been the target of rife online rumours and allegations.

As a witness in the trial, Wilds’ friendship with Syed, his drug-dealing past and his ever-changing story became popular internet fodder and several committed listeners even managed to track down his home address.

After a prolonged media silence, Wilds has shared his story in a three-part interview with The Intercept, providing an insight into the struggles he has faced since the podcast hit the internet.

Jay Wilds in a photo from his Facebook page.

“The thing that’s been the most scary for my family has been people showing up at my house,” he says.

“Twice I’ve caught people videotaping our home and me … Right before Thanksgiving. I caught somebody taking a picture of my house.”

Wilds dominates discussion on the podcast’s Reddit page, with many dissecting his testimony, questioning his involvement in the murder and digging for details from his past.

When asked if he reads the page, Wilds says he avoids it.

“It makes me too upset,” he admits.

“My wife has taken screenshots of direct threats and serious accusations about my character.”

“We filed a police report. Someone reached out to my wife, somebody that she didn’t know, saying that she was worried for my family.”

While Wilds doesn’t directly blame Serial creator and host Sarah Koenig for his troubles, he says she encouraged a negative image of him in the media.

“I feel like she created an evil archetype of me and sensationalized my motives. It helped fan the flames of this story that people had already moved on from,” Wilds says.

He also reveals that Koenig reached out to him offering him a last chance to speak on the podcast, an opportunity he declined before accusing her of leaking details online.

“It … makes me really angry,” Wilds says of his newfound notoriety.

“Because the mistakes I’ve made are on me and not on my family. And there’s a part of me that just wants to break away from them and live in the bushes or the Appalachian mountains, so they can be safe.”