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SS451 t1_je1yay7 wrote

This is a really inappropriate decision by the appeals court and emphasizes the danger of "victim's right" laws. The Lee family did not and cannot prosecute Syed, the State did. Syed did not and could not have violated the Lee family's procedural rights in connection with the hearing, the prosecution or the court did. There is no reason why the remedy for a violation of that right to be heard should run against Syed, and in fact this statute has no provision for remedies at all. The idea that reinstating a criminal conviction could be an unwritten remedy for the violation of a procedural right of a third party is bizarre. I sincerely hope that this is appealed to the Maryland Supreme Court and reversed.

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Xiriously1 t1_je22r43 wrote

Agreed, too many of the commentators are stuck on the fact that there's a cloud of suspicion around Syed and its likely he committed the crime. Whether or not he's guilty is irrelevant to the discussion here. A judge found his rights were violated in the original trial and vacated the conviction.

This appellate decision is reinstating a murder conviction, not on the basis of the lower court judge's findings being wrong per se but because the victim's brother couldn't be present at the hearing? To do what exactly? We're effectively saying that this person's rights were ruled to be violated but because the victim's family member wasn't allowed to sit in the courtroom and hear about it in person that the bell gets unsung and this person is effectively guilty of murder again?

If the defendent was sympathetic then people would be furious.

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ScrewAttackThis t1_je31twd wrote

Epstein was reinvestigated because his sweetheart deal was found to violate similar victim's rights laws.

That's basically the point of these laws. To allow victims proper notice of these decisions and to exercise their rights. Keep in mind we're talking about a vacated conviction and not an acquittal. An appeal was always possible and the state could've avoided this by just giving them proper notice.

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Khiva t1_je3i8gi wrote

Reddit is a terrible place to get takes on anything that involved a specialized field of knowledge. The law, economics, anything science ... honestly really anything than pop culture and comic books.

Unless you're in a specialized, heavily moderated subreddit you're going to be hit with a disaster of misinformed takes whenever something highly technical hits the news.

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prof_the_doom t1_je23fhp wrote

Why would the Lee family ever show up, if they think Syed is guilty, then?

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bananafobe t1_je26cx1 wrote

I'm not sure about the specifics here, but my guess is that if they opt not to attend, then there's no basis to say they were denied access, which sounds like the basis of the objection.

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