Describing the case as "relatively weak," the court ruled that the Shalimar waiter's statement that he did not know the victim undercut the prosecutor's theory that Vardhan was carrying the matchbook when he was attacked.
Norris, the prosecutor, insisted that he had turned over the records to Gantt's attorney. A federal judge ruled that he had not and ordered Gantt released or given a new trial. Because Smith was not part of the same appeal, the decision did not apply to his case.
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Last year, Los Angeles County prosecutors sought to try Gantt again.
Both the prosecution and defense returned to the matchbook in an effort to support their cases.
Prosecutors spoke to the victim's younger brother, who said family members often picked up matchbooks for his mother to use to light incense at home. Also, a friend was prepared to testify that Vardhan might have gone to the Shalimar because he visited Indian restaurants to find caterers for an Indian student association at UCLA.
Investigators for both sides interviewed the Shalimar Cuisine waiter, Ferdous Khan, who by then, 14 years later, had become the restaurant's manager.
Khan no longer denied ever visiting downtown L.A. He said he used to purchase food once or twice a week from a produce market downtown. But he said he did not remember writing his parents' phone number in a matchbook.
Gantt's new defense attorneys, Bruce Karey and Cosmo Taormina, sent an example of Khan's writing to another handwriting expert along with a photocopy of the matchbook, which had been destroyed years earlier along with other exhibits from the trial. The expert said the writing on the matchbook did not match the victim's but could be Khan's.
Then, three days into the retrial, the prosecution was dealt a fatal blow.
Rosemond, the car burglar and key witness at the first trial, retracted his statements just before he was to testify, saying he was uncertain about his identification of Gantt.
The case was dismissed, leaving Gantt a free man.
The truth about the matchbook, however, remains murky.
Deputy Dist. Atty. Robert Grace, who worked on the second trial, said that the case hinged on Rosemond's testimony but that the matchbook also pointed to Gantt's guilt.
"It definitely doesn't tend toward his innocence," Grace said.
No one believes that Khan, the restaurant manager, had anything to do with the killing. In a recent interview, Khan, 43, repeated that he did not know the victim and never made calls to Bangladesh from pay phones on skid row.
