Around Maryland

For the past two decades, Young Lee thought justice had been served when his sister’s killer was taken off the streets. He believed Baltimore prosecutors when they repeatedly expressed confidence in the case against Adnan Syed. That changed last week when the Baltimore City State’s Attorney’s Office filed a motion to vacate Syed’s 2000 murder conviction in the death of Hae Min Lee, his ex-girlfriend and high school classmate whose body was found buried in a makeshift grave in West Baltimore’s Leakin Park. Prosecutors said they reviewed the case in recent months and found alternative suspects and unreliable evidence used at trial.

Three years after protests erupted at the Johns Hopkins University over its plan to create a private police force, some opponents are promising disruptions to upcoming town hall meetings and urging Baltimore City’s mayor to block the measure. The opposition movement has been largely quiet since the state’s largest private university said in June 2020, amid the nationwide Black Lives Matter protests, that it would pause work on its police force. A year later during summer break, when campus was mostly empty, Hopkins hired Branville Bard Jr. to lead its police force.

A bitter feud has broken out this week between some community leaders in South Baltimore over a recent vote by a neighborhood group to endorse the maglev project. The verbal sparring over Baltimore’s portion of the $10 billion East Coast transportation project has escalated since the Sept. 9 vote by the board of the South Baltimore 7 Coalition, or SB7. That vote was not unanimous, but endorsed the high-speed rail line and a quest by the group to open negotiations with developer Baltimore Washington Rapid Rail, BWRR, for a community benefits agreement in return for their support.

Harford County will open its doors for previously arrested or incarcerated adults, their families, and/or anyone affected by incarceration with its fifth annual Second Chance Job and Resource Fair on Wednesday from 12-4 p.m. at The Epicenter, 21 Aberdeen Shopping Plaza in Aberdeen. The goal of the fair is to connect returning citizens with employers and important resources to help reduce barriers to success.

Montgomery County Public Schools announced more stringent safety protocols around athletic events Wednesday following a brawl that erupted at a football game last week. Under the new rules, students and spectators will be required to remain in the stands during games, and reentry will not be allowed. The rules also prevent anyone from being admitted after halftime.

A day after a Baltimore City judge overturned Adnan Syed’s murder conviction, a new episode of the hit podcast “Serial” that first made his decades-old case famous details the decision to free him. The approximately 17-minute episode, “Adnan is Out,” opens with Syed attempting to make collect call from prison before fading out to news reporters announcing, “a major development” and “a stunning reversal” in his murder case. Baltimore Circuit Judge Melissa Phinn vacated Syed’s conviction for the 1999 killing of ex-girlfriend Hae Min Lee and ordered his release Monday after prosecutors found there were alternative suspects and unreliable evidence used at his trial.