Adnan Syed Will Not Return to Prison, Judge Rules

Adnan Syed, who spent more than two decades in prison while fighting charges that he had killed his former high school girlfriend, will remain free after a judge in Baltimore on Thursday reduced his sentence to time served.

The ruling effectively brought an end to a sensational case that received widespread attention starting in 2014, when the first season of the hit podcast “Serial” raised questions about Mr. Syed’s conviction in the 1999 killing of Hae Min Lee, 18. The podcast was downloaded more than 100 million times in its first year and jump-started Mr. Syed’s fight for his freedom, which ping-ponged through the court system for more than a decade.

Judge Jennifer Schiffer of Baltimore City Circuit Court issued the ruling after prosecutors in Baltimore withdrew a motion last week to vacate his murder conviction. Mr. Syed was released from prison in 2022 after a different judge vacated the conviction, and the charges against him were dropped later that year. But his conviction was later reinstated, and last year Maryland’s highest court ordered a redoing of the hearing that initially freed him.

Judge Schiffer, who presided over that hearing on Feb. 26, said in her decision on Thursday that Mr. Syed, 43, “is not a danger to the public” and that “the interests of justice will be better served by a reduced sentence” of time served. Mr. Syed will enter a period of five years of “supervised probation,” according to her ruling.

Ms. Lee’s brother and mother had urged the court to uphold Mr. Syed’s life sentence. David Sanford, a lawyer for the family, criticized the ruling on Thursday.

“Absolutely nothing changes the fact that Mr. Syed remains convicted of first-degree premeditated murder due to overwhelming direct and circumstantial evidence,” he said in a statement. “We hope that one day Mr. Syed can summon the courage to take responsibility for his crime and express sincere remorse.”