After a very superficial read-through:
Syed’s lawyer’s made an argument that the conviction should be overturned based on ineffective assistance of counsel, citing a bunch of decisions of his trial and appellate lawyers but mainly the trial lawyer’s failure to investigate a potential alibi witness.
Under the Strickland test the court references, in order to violate the 6th Amendment, the attorney’s conduct must (1) fall below an objectively reasonable minimum standard AND (2) make it reasonably probable that the outcome would have been different otherwise. In other words, to vacate a conviction, the counsel’s conduct must be objectively unreasonable and have actually made a difference in the outcome of the trial. For example, if a defendant’s lawyer falls asleep during closing statements but the state still has a signed confession and video of the defendant committing the crime, the conviction is going to stand.
The Maryland SC here was basically saying that the failure to investigate the alibi witness violated standard of due diligence the attorney owed, BUT it probably wouldn’t have changed the outcome of the trial given all the other evidence the prosecution had.
There are also some procedural issues about when one must raise arguments about ineffective assistance, resulting that some of the issues weren’t properly before the court and were waived.
ETA: Maryland’s appeals structure confused me–this was not the SC of Maryland, it was the Court of Appeals reviewing a decision by some weird middle ground appellate court
