Adnan Syed’s legal saga, chronicled in the hit “Serial” podcast, is a blockbuster story, and for good reason. As an attorney, I’ve been following the many updates in this case. But as executive director of a victims’ rights organization that has promoted thoughtful and safe reform efforts for years, I’ve been dismayed to see a troubling — and frankly, false — narrative develop in recent weeks: that there’s a growing divide between advocates of victims’ rights and criminal justice reform.
When Syed’s murder conviction in the 1999 slaying of Baltimore County high school student Hae Min Lee was vacated because of prosecutorial and investigative failures, the headlines understandably started pouring in. And they kept coming as the conviction was reinstated — likely temporarily — by a state appellate court last month because a lower Maryland court didn’t provide Lee’s family members adequate notice of a crucial hearing leading to Syed’s release.
Some of the headlines were dumbfounding, particularly an Associated Press article titled “Adnan Syed case pits victims’ rights against justice reform,” which was carried online and in publications across the U.S.
