The Maryland Supreme Court ruled in favor this week of reinstating a murder conviction against Adnan Syed, who previously gained attention from the podcast Serial.
On Friday, the state’s highest court ruled that a decision from 2022 that freed Syed from prison needs to be redone, as it violated the victim’s family’s legal rights. In a 4-3 ruling, the Maryland Supreme Court said that the murder conviction against Syed must remain in place, nearly 11 months after the court heard arguments in a case marked by legal twists and divided rulings since Syed was convicted in 2000 for the murder of his high school ex-girlfriend, Hae Min Lee.
Syed has been out of prison in October 2022, and he will remain free as the state Supreme Court justices did not make any changes to his past release.
The ruling by the Maryland Supreme Court said that prosecutors and a lower court “worked an injustice” against the victim’s brother, Young Lee, as they attempted to fix what was seen as an injustice against Syed. The court found that Lee was not treated with “dignity, respect, and sensitivity” since he was not given adequate notice of the hearing that led to Syed’s release.
Adnan Syed and his mother Shamim Rahman talk with reporters as they arrive at Maryland’s Supreme Court in Annapolis, Maryland, on October 5, 2023. On Friday, the Maryland Supreme Court ruled in favor of reinstating a murder conviction against Adnan Syed.
AP Photo/Susan Walsh/AP Photo/Susan Walsh
In their ruling, the court said that in order to remedy the issues, they would need “to reinstate Mr. Syed’s convictions and to remand the case to the circuit court for further proceedings.”
Lee will be given a notice of a new hearing “sufficient to provide Mr. Lee with a reasonable opportunity to attend such a hearing in person,” the court ruled.
However, Maryland Supreme Court Justice Michele Hotten issued a dissenting opinion which said that “this case exists as a procedural zombie.”
“It has been reanimated, despite its expiration,” Hotten wrote. “The doctrine of mootness was designed to prevent such judicial necromancy.”
The latest development in the case highlighted the tension between recent criminal justice reform efforts and the legal rights of crime victims and their families. These voices often clash with a growing movement aimed at addressing systemic issues, including historic racism, police misconduct and prosecutorial errors.
Syed, 43, has consistently maintained his innocence and expressed concern for Lee’s surviving relatives. Lee, a teenager, was found strangled and buried in an unmarked grave in 1999. Syed was sentenced to life in prison, plus 30 years.
In September 2022, a judge in Baltimore ruled in favor of releasing Syed from prison due to flaws in the evidence and investigation.
In March 2023, the Appellate Court of Maryland, the state’s intermediate appellate court, ordered a new hearing that reinstated Syed’s conviction. The court ruled that the victim’s family had not received sufficient notice to attend the hearing in person, violating their right under state law to be “treated with dignity and respect.”
This article includes reporting from The Associated Press.
