Appeal for Adnan Syed to Continue into Next Week

BALTIMORE, MD – The man whose murder conviction gained national attention through the hit podcast Serial will return to court Monday in Baltimore as his legal team makes the case for an appeal.

Syed was convicted in 2000 and sentenced to life in prison for the murder of his ex-girlfriend Hae Min Lee. He was 18 at the time he was accused of killing her, in January 1999.

Lee went missing Jan. 13, 1999, and her body was found randomly by a stranger in Leakin Park on Feb. 9, 1999, according to court documents.

The hearings this week were intended to show that Syed’s defense was ineffective when he went to trial in 2000.

His former attorney Cristina Gutierrez allegedly failed to contact a classmate who said she saw Syed in the Woodlawn library at the time authorities said Lee was killed and could verify this through library video footage.

Syed’s attorney also claims Gutierrez did not ask prosecutors about a plea deal, which Syed requested.

Gutierrez is not able to testify; after her health rapidly deteriorated due to multiple sclerosis, she agreed to her own disbarment in 2001 and died three years later at the age of 52, according to The Baltimore Sun.

A former classmate of Syed—Asia McClain Chapman—said that she had chatted with Syed at the time of the murder in the Woodlawn library and two other students could attest to that, but despite writing a letter to his Gutierrez with that information, she said she never heard back, according to court filings.

An employee at the Woodlawn library said the facility had surveillance videos but they were erased each month and by the time Syed was arrested, the data would have been gone, according to NBC.

Even so, Syed’s attorney put a lawyer on the stand who argued that the McClain’s information about the surveillance added a layer of credibility to her testimony.

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Other data that was entered into evidence came under fire at the hearings this week.

Cell phone records that allegedly tied Syed to Leakin Park had come with a disclaimer saying that the information may not be accurate, a disclosure that was not mentioned at the trial.

According to The Guardian, Syed’s case in 2000 was among the first where cell phone records were used to geolocate someone in tying them to a crime, and the technology was far from perfect.

It is unclear when the judge may rule on Syed’s request for post-conviction relief.

Originally, the hearings were supposed to start Wednesday and end Friday, but a judge said the case would resume Monday after proceedings were unfinished by 5 p.m. on Friday, according to NBC.