The murder conviction of Adnan Syed — the subject of the hit true-crime podcastSerial —has been reinstated, according to multiple reports.
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-girlfriend Hae Min Lee, according toThe New York Times.
The court determined that the rights of Lee’s family were violated because they weren’t given proper notice of an October hearing to toss out Syed’s conviction.
“Because the circuit court violated Mr. Lee’s right to notice of, and his right to attend, the hearing on the State’s motion to vacate… this Court has the power and obligation to remedy those violations, as long we can do so without violating Mr. Syed’s right to be free from double jeopardy,” the court’s opinion said, according toCNN.
A new hearing was ordered, theTimesreports.
Hae Min Lee, Adnan Syed.NC; Courtesy Syed family
Syed was released from prison in the fall of 2022 after his first-degree murder conviction from 2000 was vacated.
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.
There was also a “substantial and significant probability that the result would have been different,” Phinn said, since new evidence came to light since the trial ended more than two decades earlier.
News of Syed’s release came after prosecutors filed a motion to vacate his murder conviction, arguing that it was riddled with problems.
Prosecutors asked that he receive a new trial, according to motions filed in circuit court.
Lloyd Fox/Baltimore Sun/Tribune News Service via Getty
Since his 2000 conviction, Syed has always maintained his innocence, which was explored in the 2014 podcast, and later anHBO documentary.
Prosecutors said that they will continue their investigation, and “bring a suspect or suspects to justice,” but also are not saying “at this time” that Syed is innocent.
Karl Merton Ferron/Baltimore Sun/TNS/Getty
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They also asked for Syed to be released on his own recognizance as the investigation continues.
“We have spent 23 years fighting the state and now the state is saying they got it wrong, maybe, and the state is saying he did not deserve to be convicted,” longtime Syed family friend Rabia Chaudry previously told PEOPLE. “To not have to fight the state is incredible.”
source: people.com
