By Alex Mann and Lee O. Sanderlin Baltimore Sun • Sep 20, 2022 at 8:40 am
VIDEO - People react as Adnan Syed leaves the courthouse after being released from prison. (Baltimore Sun)
Adnan Syed — the man whose legal saga spawned the hit podcast “Serial” — walked away from a Baltimore courthouse Monday free of shackles after 23 years.
Baltimore Circuit Judge Melissa Phinn overturned Syed’s murder conviction in the 1999 killing of Hae Min Lee after prosecutors raised doubts about his guilty finding because of the revelation of alternative suspects in the homicide and unreliable evidence used against him at trial.
Saying her ruling was in the “interest of justice and fairness,” Phinn ordered Syed placed on home detention, wearing a GPS monitor, while Baltimore State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby’s office chooses whether to drop his charges or to try him again for murder in his ex-girlfriend’s death. Prosecutors have 30 days to make a decision.