Sarah Koenig

Adnan's lawyer made a brief statement.

And within about 40 minutes, the judge was ready with her decision.

On this 19th day of September 2022, she said, in the interests of justice, the motion to vacate is hereby granted.

You might be asking, what on earth happened?

I've spent the last few days trying to understand it myself.

Wherefore this motion to vacate that burst like a firework out of the prosecutor's office?

The very same office that asked the jury in 1999 to, quote, come back with a guilty finding for first-degree premeditated murder by the defendant, Adan Syed.

The prosecutors today are not saying Adnan is innocent.

They stopped short of exonerating him.

Instead, they're saying that back in 1999, we didn't investigate this case thoroughly enough.

We relied on evidence we shouldn't have.

And we broke the rules when we prosecuted.

This wasn't an honest conviction.

According to the prosecutor's office, they didn't set out to pick apart Adnan's case, their own case, mind you.

They say it just kind of crumbled once they took a hard look.

I know.

If you've heard season one of Serial, you know how I got there.

Here's how they got there.

Almost a year ago, a new law took effect in Maryland, the Juvenile Restoration Act.

One of the things the law says is that if you've served at least 20 years in prison for a crime you committed when you were a juvenile, you can ask the court to reduce your sentence, maybe even let you out.