‘Serial’: Adnan Syed’s Lawyer Says New Evidence Could Overturn His Murder

The attorney for “Serial” podcast subject Adnan Syed says key cellphone evidence used against his client was unreliable – by the phone company’s own warning – and should have been excluded from his murder trial.

However, in a note attached to the data, AT&T warned that only outgoing calls can be traced, and that “incoming calls will not be considered reliable information for location”. “We hope the court considers it”.

The incoming call data was used by prosecutors to argue that Syed was clearly in the Leakin Park area the night police believe murder victim (and Syed’s ex-girlfriend) Hae Min Lee’s body was buried. Adnan, whose case was the focus of the Serial podcast, is serving a life sentence for the murder of his ex-girlfriend, Hae Min Lee. Questions surrounding Syed’s conviction inspired the popular 12-episode Serial podcast, attracting global attention to the case.

The new evidence, Syed’s lawyer reportedly says, is the cover letter of a fax sent to one of the detectives from AT&T in February 1999, reading, “Outgoing calls only are reliable for location status”.

Syed told his first defense attorney, M. Cristina Gutierrez, about McClain. If it had, “much of, if not all of, the cellular evidence would have been rendered inadmissible”, he said.

He also said that she failed to interview a witness who could have potentially given him an alibi.

The Maryland attorney general’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Lee went missing after classes on 13 January 1999. In May, the court called on the Baltimore Circuit Court to reopen Syed’s case so testimony from McClain could be added.

The appeals court’s order does not guarantee Ms McClain will be allowed to testify. “There is no imaginable way this could have been a strategic choice”.

This is the second instance of Syed’s lawyers claiming he was given “ineffective assistance” by Gutierrez, who died in 2004.

“It would be a miscarriage of justice”, Brown concluded, “to allow Syed’s conviction to stand when this evidence was used to obtain the conviction”.