In a court filing on late Thursday evening, the attorneys for the family of Hae Min Lee argued that their “appeal is not moot.”
Young Lee, the victim representative for Hae Min Lee who was murdered in 1999, filed an appeal arguing that his rights had been violated during the process of vacating Adnan Syed’s conviction.
Hae Min Lee (Family Photo)
Syed was tried for Hae Min Lee’s murder in the early 2000’s, but an investigation but in September of this year, the State’s Attorney’s Office joined with his defense attorneys in a motion to vacate the conviction over a Brady violation.
Young Lee had requested that the hearing be delayed so that he could speak in person, but the judge denied that request, and Lee spoke over video conferencing, before Syed was released.
Lee and his legal team are arguing that they weren’t provided enough notice before the hearing.
“The voices of the Lee family were silenced,” says the new court filing. “Prosecutors went out of their way to evade the Constitution’s absolute requirements.”
Adnan Syed, center right, leaves the courthouse after the hearing, Monday, Sept. 19, 2022, in Baltimore. A Baltimore judge on Monday ordered the release of Syed after overturning his conviction for the 1999 murder of high school student Hae Min Lee — a case that was chronicled in the hit podcast “Serial,” a true-crime series that transfixed listeners and revolutionized the genre. (Jerry Jackson/The Baltimore Sun via AP)
Since that hearing, the State’s Attorney’s Office has dropped all charges against Adnan Syed and has stated that they have no intention to re-try him for the murder.
Lee’s legal team is arguing that the Court should rule on their appeal, because it’s not moot and even if the Court agrees that the underlying case is moot, “it should hear it as a well-recognized exception to mootness.”
They go on to argue that even if it doesn’t change the outcome of this case, it would be important to rule on this to preserve victims’ rights in future cases.
This story was originally published Oct. 27, 2022 by WMAR in Baltimore, an E.W. Scripps Company.
