Decide vacates Syed’s conviction for 1999 homicide as prosecutors reinvestigate case that was focus of ‘Serial’ podcast.
A Maryland decide has vacated the 2000 homicide conviction of Adnan Syed after prosecutors mentioned there have been two different potential suspects within the killing of his former girlfriend who had been by no means disclosed to the defence at trial.
The case gained nationwide consideration when the podcast “Serial” raised doubts about his guilt.
Syed, now 42, has all the time mentioned he was harmless and didn’t kill Hae Min Lee, who was 18 when she was strangled and buried in a Baltimore park in 1999.
Decide Melissa Phinn of the Circuit Courtroom in Baltimore on Monday ordered Syed to be launched from jail and placed on dwelling detention. Prosecutors have 30 days to hunt a brand new trial or dismiss the case.
The state’s lawyer for Baltimore filed a movement to vacate the conviction on Wednesday following a year-long investigation carried out alongside a public defender representing Syed, during which a number of issues had been discovered with witnesses and proof from the trial.
Prosecutors informed the courtroom that they weren’t asserting that Syed is harmless however that they not had confidence in “the integrity of the conviction”, and that justice required that Syed no less than be afforded a brand new trial.
They mentioned Syed needs to be launched from jail, the place he has spent twenty years, whereas prosecutors full the investigation and determine whether or not to hunt a brand new trial.
Prosecutors mentioned that they’d discovered new details about two different suspects, whom they haven’t named. Their identities had been recognized to the unique prosecutors however not disclosed to the defence as required by legislation.
Prosecutors additionally determined a key witness and the detective who investigated the homicide had been unreliable. Additionally they discovered new info that solid doubt on the cellphone information prosecutors relied upon at trial to put Syed on the scene of the homicide.
The podcast “Serial”, produced by Chicago public radio station WBEZ, drew nationwide consideration to the case in 2014.
Marilyn Mosby, the state’s lawyer for Baltimore, mentioned in an announcement that “the particular person accountable for this heinous crime should be held accountable”.
Younger Lee, the sufferer’s brother, informed the courtroom he was shocked and his household felt betrayed that the prosecutors had reversed course after standing by the conviction for many years.
“It’s actually powerful to undergo this many times and once more,” he mentioned. “It’s a residing nightmare.”
Video footage from Monday confirmed Syed, wearing a white shirt and a blue tie, waving to a crowd of supporters exterior the courtroom as he was being escorted to a car that drove him away.
The Innocence Venture, an advocacy group that pushes for felony justice reform, welcomed Syed’s launch, saying that the case underscores the difficulty of prosecutors illegally withholding exculpatory proof.
“The integrity of the authorized system requires accountability for not solely Mr Syed’s wrongful conviction but in addition the ache the State’s illegal conduct triggered to Hae Min Lee’s household,” the group mentioned in an announcement.