Maryland appellate court refuses to reconsider Adnan Syed’s sentence

BALTIMORE – A Maryland appellate court docket on Tuesday denied a request by Adnan Syed’s lawyer to rethink its latest determination to reinstate his homicide conviction. His lawyer mentioned she’s going to enchantment to the Maryland Supreme Court docket.

The Appellate Court docket of Maryland reinstated the conviction in March in a ruling that upheld arguments from the sufferer’s household claiming a decrease court docket violated their rights.

E. Gregory Wells, the chief decide of the appellate court docket, signed a short order saying that the three-judge panel that made the preliminary ruling denied Syed’s movement, “as a result of it’s based mostly on an argument not beforehand raised.”

Syed’s attorneys claimed the appellate judges broke from the court docket’s personal precedent by failing to require the sufferer’s household to show the result of the September listening to would have been completely different if they’d obtained extra discover and attended in individual. The movement additionally questions whether or not the court docket intends to award crime victims and their representatives “particular therapy not even obtainable to legal defendants.”

Erica Suter, Syed’s lawyer, mentioned she would enchantment to the state’s highest court docket.

“Appellate courts routinely assess whether or not an error impacted the underlying proceedings,” Suter mentioned in an announcement. “We’re dismayed that the Appellate Court docket of Maryland opted not to take action right here. We might be searching for evaluation within the Supreme Court docket of Maryland.”

Syed — whose lengthy authorized case gained worldwide consideration in 2014 from the debut season of the hit podcast “Serial” — regained his freedom final 12 months when Baltimore prosecutors moved to vacate his conviction, saying they reviewed the case and located different suspects and unreliable proof used at trial.

However the sufferer’s household mentioned they obtained inadequate discover to attend the September vacatur listening to in individual, which violated their proper to be “handled with dignity and respect,” and the state’s intermediate appellate court docket agreed. In a 2-1 determination that was stayed for 60 days, the judges reinstated Syed’s conviction and ordered a redo of the listening to in query.

Syed was 17 when his highschool ex-girlfriend and classmate, Hae Min Lee, was discovered strangled to loss of life and buried in a makeshift grave in 1999. He was arrested weeks later and in the end convicted of homicide. He obtained life in jail, plus 30 years.

Syed has remained free because the case continues.

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