October/November 2022
what’s in THIS ISSUE
Volume 59 Issue 5
Adnan Syed: Where The Case Went Wrong Sarah Mies
Study Tips
Convience Store Crimes
Eat More Veggies?
St. Francis Day of Service
The state of Maryland released Adnan Syed from prison on September 19, 2022. He was sentenced to life plus 30 years back in 2000 for the murder of Hae Min Lee, his ex-girlfriend. On September 14, a motion to vacate was filed against the judgment of Syed, and less than a week later, he went home for the first time in over two decades. After years of investigation, the state discovered that the evidence the state presented against Syed back in 2000 was faulty. The integrity of the investigation and trial is now in question. On October 11, 2022, the DA of Balitmore Country dropped all charges against Syed after discovering that DNA evidence ruled him out as a suspect. Why was he charged to begin with? Why did an innocent man spend 22 years in jail? To understand, one must start by breaking down the case. On January 13, 1999, 18-year-old Hae Min Lee disappeared after school. On February 9, Lee’s body was discovered in Leakin Park in Baltimore County, Maryland. She was buried in the park, and the medical examiner at the time found the cause of death be strangulation along with blunt force trauma to the head. Not too long after, Adnan Syed became a suspect. He and Lee had dated for a while but broke up in December of 1998. At the beginning of the investigation, the police had multiple suspects. However, the spotlight landed on Syed after a man named Jay Wilds came to the police. Wilds was a friend of Syed and claims he was with him throughout the day on January 13. According to the motion to vacate, Wilds testified that “Defendant said he was going to kill the victim, Defendant admitted to strangling the victim, Defendant showed Wilds
Credit: Rabia Chaudry on Instagram
Managing Editor
Adnan Syed before and after his 22 year sentance in jail
the body in the trunk of her car, and Wilds helped the Defendant bury the body in Leakin Park.” This testimony became the main component, along with some cell phone records, for the case against Syed. While Wilds’ testimony built the case for the prosecution, but this is where the problems began. Wilds’ story changed many times between his various interviews with the police and his testimony at trial. One of the leading detectives on the case, Greg MacGillivary, said: “that Wilds’ statements to the police had lots of inconsistencies and regarded them as lies” (from the transcript of the trial). The inconstancies had to do with the location of which Syed allegedly showed Wilds Lee’s body in the trunk, the timing of the murder, where they went after the murder, and who they saw that day. Somehow, these lies did not make Wilds an unreliable witness, and his testimony was allowed in court. The initial trial in this case ended in a mistrial due to the behavior of the defense attorney Crisitna Gutierrez, who was representing Syed. After the mistrial, Wilds’ story changed again for the second trial. The other central aspect of the prosecution’s case against Syed was cell
phone records from Syed’s phone. Wilds makes many claims in his testimony regarding who had the phone and the calls that were made. The cellphone records created a timeline for Wilds’ story. However, only four out of 14 calls made on the day Lee disappeared corroborate Wilds’ testimony. Neither the phone records nor Wilds’ testimony would be enough to find Syed guilty, but putting both together was helpful to the state’s case. Gutierrez failed to properly interview witnesses, properly crossexamine those testifying against Syed, and disregarded vital information to the case because she “seemingly did not realize the importance” of evidence presented in the case materials, including witness testimony, timing issues, and lack of motive. The second trial ended with a guilty verdict for Syed, and he was sentenced to life plus 30 years. After the trial was over, the investigation never really stopped. The case of Hae Min Lee was covered heavily in the media. The hit podcast series “Serial” goes into deep detail and contains information directly from Syed. There is also a four-part documentary series on HBO regarding this case. Pieces are starting to come together, and the public is now aware of more issues in this case that makes the guilty verdict for
Syed questionable. One of the issues has to do with Detective William Ritz, who worked alongside Detective MacGillivary on the case. In the motion to vacate, the public learns Ritz’s lack of work in some investigations has put innocent civilians behind bars for decades. Once these detectives began focusing on Syed, they disregarded any other suspects and built a case against him instead of searching for the truth. Since the trial has ended, it was discovered that any phone records “would not be considered reliable information for location,” making them practically worthless. Both Wilds’ testimony and the cell records, the main components of the prosecution’s case, are unreliable. It is difficult to grasp that even with the severe lack of evidence against Syed, the defense lost the case. Gutirrez was later disbarred for failure to perform proper legal work. Hae Min Lee’s murder remains a mystery. Two new suspects have been discovered; their names have not yet been shared with the public. These two suspects are said to have a motive, previous history of violence against women, and connections to important locations for the crime. The motion to vacate also announces that “one suspect was improperly cleared as a suspect” during the original investigation in 1999. One may wonder, if there is no concrete evidence that Syed committed this murder, why did the investigation solely focus on him? There is no definitive answer to this question. But it is important to note that Syed was a Muslim, and bias may have played a role when it comes to his conviction. There is a great deal of information on this case that can be researched for hours. This article is a small snapshot of all the known information. Readers are encouraged to learn more.