By Tavon N. Thomasson
AFRO Intern
Supporters of former Baltimore State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby gathered outside the State’s Attorney’s Office on July 18, condemning what they believe to be a political effort to discredit her and strip Mosby of her law license.
Demonstrators said the protest was organized in response to Mosby’s recent public claim that current State’s Attorney Ivan Bates filed a formal complaint with the Attorney Grievance Commission, concerning her involvement in the Adnan Syed case.
“That’s why I was down there, to expose this stuff,” said Tyrone W. Bost, one of the protest organizers and a member of the grassroots group Committee to Free Marilyn Mosby. “All this stuff filed to the Attorney Grievance [Commission], it’s nothing more than an attempt to make her look bad when they go to try to take her law license.”
According to an executive summary released by the State’s Attorney Office, Mosby’s administration filed a motion in 2022 to vacate Adnan Syed’s conviction in the 1999 killing of Hae Min Lee, citing issues such as the suppression of information about other possible suspects and doubts about the reliability of key trial evidence.
While the state did not declare Syed innocent, it argued that the fairness of the original trial had been compromised and that Syed should be granted a new one. A judge agreed, vacating the conviction based on what the court described as significant flaws in how the case had been prosecuted.
That decision–once hailed by Mosby’s supporters as a landmark moment–has since been walked back by her successor.
In a Feb. 25 press release, Bates announced his office had withdrawn the motion to vacate Syed’s conviction filed by Mosby’s administration. The previous motion, he stated, contained “false and misleading statements that undermine the integrity of the judicial process.”
Bost said the group wants to ensure that decisions involving Mosby and the Syed case are made transparently and with public accountability.
“Before he went to office, he campaigned that he was going to let Adnan Syed go, exonerate him on the spot and now you’re changing your mind,” said Bost regarding Bates. “The whole thing just stinks. We are not going to give him the privacy to do this stuff behind closed doors.”
The AFRO reached out to the State’s Attorney’s Office for further comment regarding the complaint. A representative responded, “Filings are confidential, and we cannot comment.”