The subject of the first season of the popular legal podcast Serial has been granted a new trial in large part due to questions about the reliability of the prosecution’s cell phone expert witness used to convict him. An appellate court vacated the murder conviction of Adnan Syed citing the failure of his attorney to challenge the prosecution’s cell tower expert witness over some flawed logic, giving Syed an opportunity to pursue a re-trial with a different lawyer. Prosecutors have promised to appeal the ruling, but should it stand then they will need to prepare for a second murder trial.
Serial’s Adnan Syed Granted a New Trial
Late last month, Judge Martin P Welch of the Baltimore City Circuit Court granted a motion by Adnan Syed requesting a re-trial for the 1999 murder of his former girlfriend Hae Min Lee. Syed, now 35, was 17-year-old when he was convicted in 2000 for Lee’s murder, and has spent the last 16 years serving a life sentence in Maryland. In 2014, the podcast Serial introduced Syed’s case to the nation, and opened up the opportunity for attorneys to question the legitimacy of the evidence used to convict the defendant, particularly testimony from a cell phone tower expert witness called by prosecutors.
During post-conviction hearings in February of this year, Syed’s attorneys presented new evidence of an alibi witness and raised questions about the validity of the prosecution’s cell phone expert. According to Syed’s current counsel, his lawyer during the initial trial was “grossly negligent” by failing to pursue all the possible evidence which could help her client, including a counter expert who could have raised doubts about the prosecution’s case. Defense attorneys representing Syed called the ruling an important victory, but cautioned the process is far from over as the Baltimore District Attorney still has the opportunity to appeal Judge Welch’s ruling before having to re-try Syed for Lee’s murder.
Syed Motion for New Trial Focuses on Shaky Expert Testimony
One of the central figure’s in Syed’s 2000 murder trial was a cell phone tower expert witness who the prosecution used to place the defendant at the scene of Lee’s burial. In 2000, the state called FBI Special Agent Abraham Waranowitz to testify about how cell phone tower triangulation could identify a person’s location. Waranowitz discussed two incoming calls to Adnan’s cell phone which arguably made it likely that he was located in an area where Lee’s body was later found at a time shortly after her death. Waranowitz’s expert witness testimony was one of the key pieces of evidence prosecutors used to connect Syed to Lee’s death, but the expert’s reliability became a matter of interest for Adnan’s post-conviction defense team.
According to Syed’s legal team, his initial lawyer received a communication from AT&T which provided instructions on how to read and interpret cell phone activity with a notable disclaimer regarding locating phones that read, “Outgoing calls only are reliable for location status. Any incoming calls will not be reliable information for location.” Waranowitz’s expert testimony focused only on incoming calls, which, according to the AT&T information, are not reliable for location identification, however, Syed’s trial attorney declined to press the expert on that information. Attorneys for Syed argued that this failure to properly cross-examine an expert witness represented a grossly negligent failure by Adnan’s trial lawyer.
Appeals Judge Grants Adnan Syed a New Trial Citing Expert Testimony
Judge Welch agreed with Syed’s legal team, and found the failure to question the state’s cell phone tower expert about a notable flaw in his conclusion to be a key factor in granting the defendant a new trial. Judge Welch pointed out the state’s expert was “directly contradicted by the disclaimer” and went on to note that “A reasonable attorney would have exposed the misleading nature of the state’s theory by cross-examining Abraham Waranowitz. The record reflects, however, that trial counsel failed to cross-examine Waranowitz about the disclaimer.”
Judge Welch’s ruling does not guarantee Syed a new trial, but with a sound legal reasoning and legitimate questions about the reliability of the expert witness who helped put the defendant in jail, Adnan’s legal team has expressed optimism that the ruling will survive appeals. Should Adnan Syed be officially granted a new trial, his high-profile legal team will certainly present new cell phone expert witness testimony to contradict the state’s key piece of evidence which connected Syed to the scene of Lee’s burial.