After nine execution dates and last three meals, Richard Glossip can soon walk free

Just a few minutes later The United States Supreme Court issued his opinion giving Richard Glossip a new trial, his lawyer Don Knight began to receive an avalanche of texts. “My phone exploded, my email exploded,” Knight said. When he spoke with his client on the phone, Glossip had already heard the news. His wife Lea had read his opinion on the phone: the court had ruled that the prosecutors of the city of Oklahoma could not correct the false testimony of their star witness against Glossip and that their conviction and death sentence could not bear. “Because the prosecution violated its obligations,” Judge Sonia Sotomayor wrote For most of the court, “we revert the sentence below and refer the case for a new trial.”

The opinion was a sharp rebuke for the Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma, which has repeatedly rejected Glossip appeals despite the growing evidence of his innocence in the 1997 murder of the owner of the Barry Van Tresese Motel. The ruling is also a great victory for Oklahoma’s attorney general, Gentner Drummond, who had previously taken Extraordinary step To ask OCCA to cancel Glossip condemnation after concluding that it had been mortally contaminated by fiscal misconduct. Finally, it is a transcendental victory for Glossip, which has been Scheduled for execution Nine times and last three meals have been served, as well as for Knight, who has spent the last decade fighting to free his client.

The Glossip case will finally be sent back to the city of Oklahoma, where the elected district prosecutor will have to decide if Glossip should be in his requirement. If you refuse to do it, Glossip could soon leave prison.

“Today was a victory for justice and equity in our judicial system,” Knight said in a statement. “Rich Glossip, who has maintained his innocence for 27 years, will now have the opportunity to have the fair trial that has always been denied.”

Glossip was sentenced twice and sentenced to die for the murder of Van Treese inside an Inn Best Budget Side on the outskirts of Oklahoma City. No physical evidence linked Glossip, the living manager of the motel, with crime. The case against him was almost completely based on the testimony of a 19 -year -old maintenance man named Justin Sneed, who admitted to having killed Van Treese, but insisted that he was Glossip’s idea. In exchange for testifying against Glossip, Sneed escaped the death penalty and was sentenced to life imprisonment without probation.

In the trial, prosecutors portrayed Sneed, a chronic drug user prone to unpredictable episodes of violence, as an unfortunate follower who acted under the complete control of Glossip. “It’s as if Justin Sneed was a rotTweiler puppy … and Richard Glossip was the dog coach,” the prosecutors argued to Glossip’s jury in 2004. “It doesn’t matter how cutting it, it doesn’t matter how to analyze it, the person who says’ sic ’em’ is the person who makes the decision.”

In 2022, the State began to free Glossip’s lawyers from previously not revealed case documents that revealed that Sneed gave false statements in the second Glossip trial, and that prosecutors were aware of their wrong statements, but could not correct their testimony. In other words, jury members condemned Glossip to Die based on the testimony of a known liar.

While he was In jail, Sneed had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and prescribed him lithium to handle him. However, when he testified against Glossip, Sneed denied having seen a psychiatrist and said he had no idea what they had given him lithium.

The records included notes of a meeting between SNEED and prosecutor Connie Smothermon that took place shortly before the new Glossip trial. In the notes, Smothermon wrote the name of a doctor – “Dr. Trompet? ” – And a reference to the powerful mood that stabilizes the lithium of the drug -” about lithium? “

As Glossip’s lawyers later discussed before the Oklahoma court, the “trumpet” was clearly a reference to Lawrence Trombka, the only psychiatrist who worked in the prison of the city of Oklahoma at the time Sneed was imprisoned there, and therefore, the only person authorized to diagnose Sneed’s disorder and prescribe to Lithium. The notes made it clear that Sneed had, in the best case, to have misrepresented the situation under oath, when he testified that while he was in jail he had a cold and asked Sudafad, but that “they somehow ended up giving me lithium for some reason. I don’t know why,” he said. “I have never seen any psychiatrist or anything.”

“So you don’t know why they gave you that?” Smothermon asked.

“No,” Sneed replied.

This exchange was in the heart of Drummond 2023 to cancel Glossip’s conviction. “There is no dispute that Sneed was the key witness of the State in the second trial. If Sneed had accurately revealed that he had seen a psychiatrist, then the defense would probably have learned … the true reason for the prescription of Sneed lithium, “Drummond wrote on a motion to the Criminal Appeals Court of Oklahoma.” With this more information the history of Sneed drug addiction, the State believes that a qualified defense lawyer could probably have attacked Sneed’s ability to Properly remember the key facts in the second trial. “

In his ruling, the majority of the Supreme Court agreed. The entire case against Glossip was based on Sneed’s testimony, Sotomayor wrote in an opinion united by the president of the Supreme Court John Roberts and Judges Elena Kagan, Brett Kavanaugh and Ketanji Brown Jackson. “Because Sneed’s testimony was the only direct evidence of Glossip ‘guilt for capital murder, Sneed’s credibility jury was necessarily decisive here,” Sotomayor wrote. “In addition to Sneed, no other witness or physical evidence established that Glossip orchestrated the murder of Van Treese. Therefore, the jury could condemn Glossip only if he believed Sneed. ” And Sneed’s credibility as a witness would have been undermined if the jury had been aware of the truth. Glossip prosecutors had not been able to correct Sneed’s misleading testimony, since they were constitutionally obliged to do, the court ruled. “The intermediate revelation of a prosecutor Sneed lied at the stand would have undergone significantly,” Sotomayor wrote.

But the court did not stop there, noting that the violation was part of a constellation of prosecuting behavior. “The additional behavior of the prosecution undermines the confidence in the verdict,” Sotomayor wrote. The State had Key evidence destroyed Before Glossip’s new trial and had hidden evidence that Sneed sought to retract his testimony that Glossip involved in the crime. She also pointed out an attempt by state prosecutors to have Sned Check your testimony about the murder to better adjust to his theory of crime.

The victory of the complete court was a surprise for many close to the case, which had been speculated later The court heard oral arguments Last October, I would probably send the return case for a probative hearing. In a partial dissent, Judge Amy Coney Barrett argued that this would have been the most appropriate action, while agreed that prosecutors had violated the constitutional rights of Glossip. But most finally decided that this was not necessary. “Because extensive evidence supports the confession of error of the Attorney General in this Court, there is also no need to re -remain for more probative procedures in the Occa.”

Judge Clarence Thomas dissent from the majority, writing his own opinion, to which Judge Samuel Alito was joined. In Thomas’s opinion, Sneed’s testimony was “obviously irrelevant” to the result of Glossip’s trial. He also supported the Occa absurd opinion That testimony of Sneed was not “clearly false” because “it was more than probable that he denied his mental health disorders”, although there was nothing in the registry that supports that statement. Most flatly rejected the idea. “Sneed’s beliefs do not come to the case,” Sotomayor wrote. “What matters is that his testimony was false and a prosecutor knowingly let him stand.”

At a press conference after the ruling, Drummond, who runs for the governor of Oklahoma, reiterated his support for the death penalty, emphasizing that he has attended the eight Executives carried out since he assumed the position. Drummond told journalists that when he became a general prosecutor, he reviewed all the state’s death sentences “and one stood out.” The “mission” of his office is “to seek justice, not defend the prosecution,” he said, so he tried to condemn him by Glossip Anulate.

Drummond said he was “happy that the Superior Court has validated my serious concerns about how this prosecution was handled, and I am grateful that we now have a new opportunity to see that justice is done.”

Now, Glossip’s case will be returned to Oklahoma City, where the current district prosecutor, Vicki Behenna, will review the evidence and decide whether to try Glossip for the third time. If she decides not to do it, Glossip would finally be released from prison. During his press conference, Drummond said he has conferred with Behenna and that the two plan “to review the evidence with new eyes.”

Twenty -eight years after the murder, and without evidence apart from the highly questionable story of Sneed’s crime, it is difficult to see how prosecutors could advance with another trial. A potential resolution for the case is that they offer Glossip an agreement to declare themselves guilty of a minor crime, specifically of being an accessory after Van Trese’s murder. Possibly, this is the only position that had some basis, and that is what Glossip was originally accused in 1997. On the night he hit Van Trese, Sneed told Glossip that he had killed the owner of the motel. Glossip did not immediately share this information with the police, Later he told themBecause I didn’t believe what Sneed says.

For now, Knight is preparing Glossip for what comes next. Knight accredited his colleague, Paralegal Meri Ellzey, for being an instrumental part of his fight of a decade to free Glossip, and sounded cautiously optimistic that his client’s long proof will finally end.

“I am still a type of type of one step on time,” Knight said. “I understand where I am now, and I realize that, you know, I am not in the finish line, but, for God, I can see it now.”