Officials escort Adnan Syed from the courthouse following the completion of the first day of hearings for a retrial in Baltimore on Feb. 3, 2016.
“It was a strategy to inflame racial and religious prejudice against a brown Muslim man,” Raju said.
“This is something that has been used to justify colonialism going way back … This notion that men of color, men coming from Asian, South Asian cultures, are inherently misogynistic towards their women, which justifies the intervention that needs to occur,” Selod said.
California passed the Racial Justice Act in 2020, empowering defenders to challenge racial disparities in arrests, charging and sentences.
If mirrored around the country, this law has the potential to protect other young people of color who might have been in the same position as Syed, Raju said.