Hearing that freed Adnan Syed should be redone, victim's brother says in appeal
BALTIMORE - The brother of Hae Min Lee made an argument in a brief filed Friday appealing for a redo of the hearing in which Lee's ex-boyfriend Adnan Syed's murder conviction was overturned.
Young Lee's appeal center's around the short notice for the hearing he received from Baltimore prosecutors, which he says denied him his rights as the representative of a crime victim.
Lee, a student at Woodlawn High School, was murdered in 1999. Syed was charged and then convicted of first-degree murder in 2000.
After spending more than 22 years in prison, Syed's murder conviction was vacated, and the court dropped his charges, allowing him to walk out a free man.
Now, Lee's murder remains unsolved.
A brief for the appeal was filed Friday by Attorney Steve Kelly on Lee's behalf.
"The circuit court denied [Young Lee] proper notice and the right to be heard at the vacatur proceedings for his sister's convicted murderer, Adnan Syed," Kelly said. "This appeal is ripe and not moot because Mr. Lee seeks an effective, tangible form of relief: a redo of the vacatur hearing with the proper procedures and safeguards."
Kelly said the Baltimore City State's Attorney's Office gave his client less than one business day's notice for the hearing, and that he was denied the right to fully participate in the proceeding because he wasn't provided with adequate notice, facts, or evidence.
Lee argues he should be allowed to make the case that Mosby's office violated the Maryland Declaration of Rights "mandate to treat victims with 'dignity, respect, and sensitivity.'"
The filing also references a Baltimore Banner story in which reporters obtained handwritten notes from Kevin Urick, an original prosecutor on the case. Prosecutors leaned on the note, saying it references evidence highlighting a potential new suspect.
But Urick told the Baltimore Banner he was writing about Syed, not any alternative suspect.
Holding a new and legally compliant vacatur hearing is the only way Lee could meaningfully participate in the hearing and properly represent his sister, the filing says.
Baltimore prosecutors dropped Syed's charges on Oct. 12 after new DNA testing results excluded him from evidence in the murder of his ex-girlfriend.
The prosecutors argued that an investigation conducted by prosecutors and Syed's defense revealed previously undisclosed evidence pointing to two other suspects.
Baltimore prosecutors dropped Syed's charges on Oct. 12 after new DNA testing results excluded him from evidence in the murder of his ex-girlfriend.
Syed's attorneys also argued they did not receive evidence at the time of the trial, a possible violation of the Brady rule requiring prosecutors to turn over all exculpatory evidence.