Adnan Syed Remains Free 'for the Time Being' as His Lawyer Slams Court: 'No Basis to Retraumatize' Him

Adnan Syed.Photo: JIM LO SCALZO/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock

A Maryland court on Tuesdayreinstated the first-degree murder conviction ofSerial’sAdnan Syed, and his attorney is criticizing the court’s 2-1 decision.

Assistant Public Defender Erica J. Suter, Syed’s attorney and Director of the Innocence Project Clinic at University of Baltimore Law School, says the appellate court’s decision “was not about Adnan’s innocence but about notice and mootness.”

The conviction was reinstated after the Appellate Court of Maryland decided that a lower court violated the rights of Young Lee, the brother of Syed’s murdered ex-girlfriendHae Min Lee, because the Lee family wasn’t given proper notice of an October hearing to toss out Syed’s conviction, according toThe New York Times.

A new hearing was ordered, theTimesreports.

Syed, 41, will not have to report back to prison immediately because thecourt issued a 60-day stay, which “gives the parties time to assess how to proceed in response to this Court’s decision.”

Syed, who has always maintained his innocence, was sentenced in 2000 to life in prison for the 1999 murder of Lee, his 18-year-old Woodlawn High School classmate and ex-girlfriend, whose body was found buried in a park four weeks after she was reportedly kidnapped.

Hae Min Lee, Adnan Syed.NC; Courtesy Syed family

Syed had been imprisoned for more than a decade when his case was featured in the first season of NPR’s true-crime podcastSerial, triggering widespread scrutiny of his arrest and prosecution.

Syed was released from prison in the fall of 2022 after being cleared of the first-degree murder charge. Last fall, Baltimore Circuit Judge Melissa Phinn wrote in an order that prosecutors failed to turn over evidence to Syed’s lawyers that could have helped prove that he didn’t kill Lee.

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There was also a “substantial and significant probability that the result would have been different,” Phinn said.

“We intend to seek review in Maryland’s highest court, the Supreme Court of Maryland, and will continue to fight until Adnan’s convictions are fully vacated,” reads the statement. “Ensuring justice for Hae Min Lee does not require injustice for Adnan.”

source: people.com