“Richard Glossip, the Oklahoma man who spent nearly 30 years on death row before his murder conviction was overturned by the US Supreme Court last year, pleaded guilty Thursday to accessory to murder after the fact, avoiding a third murder trial, his attorney told CNN. The plea agreement came during what was expected to be”, — write on: www.cnn.com
Richard Glossip, the Oklahoma man who spent nearly 30 years on death row before his murder conviction was overturned by the US Supreme Court last year, pleaded guilty Thursday to accessory to murder after the fact, avoiding a third murder trial, his attorney told CNN.
The plea agreement came during what was expected to be a pretrial hearing ahead of a retrial scheduled for December on a charge of first-degree murder.
Instead, his sentencing is scheduled for December 17 and 18, his attorney said. His defense plans to ask for time served, while prosecutors said they intend to seek additional prison time.
The guilty plea is the latest twist in a sprawling legal saga for Glossip, now 63, that stems from the 1997 killing of an Oklahoma City motel owner, Barry Van Treese.
At two murder trials, Justin Sneed, a motel employee who admitted to killing Van Treese with a baseball bat, took the stand and testified Glossip, the motel manager, put him up to it as part of a murder-for-hire plot. Glossip was convicted and sentenced to death in 1998 — a conviction that was overturned because of ineffective defense counsel — and then again in 2004.
Sneed received a life sentence in exchange for his testimony against Glossip.
While on death row, Glossip was scheduled to be put to death nine times and was served three last meals but narrowly avoided execution. In 2015, his execution was stopped at the last minute by then-Gov. Mary Fallin after officials discovered a mix-up in a shipment of lethal injection drugs.
But persistent questions about Sneed’s testimony and the lack of evidence linking Glossip to the crime led to a bipartisan investigation challenging the legitimacy of the conviction. In 2023, Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond, a Republican, moved to vacate Glossip’s conviction.
Last year, the US Supreme Court in a split decision overturned the conviction and ordered a new trial, citing Sneed’s false testimony and the prosecution’s withholding of evidence from the defense.
“We conclude that the prosecution violated its constitutional obligation to correct false testimony,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote for the majority.
Sneed has never publicly recanted his testimony. But Glossip’s legal team has produced witnesses who claim Sneed exonerated Glossip in private conversations, along with a handwritten note from prison in which he asks, “Do I have the choice of re-canting my testimony at anytime during my life, or anything like that.”
Still, Drummond said last June his office planned to retry Glossip on a murder charge.
As he awaited his third trial, Glossip was released on bond in May thanks to funds from the celebrity and criminal reform advocate Kim Kardashian.
Glossip has maintained his innocence, attorney says
Drummond said Thursday that accepting the lesser charge for Glossip was a “difficult decision,” according to CNN affiliate KOKH.
“Today, Richard Glossip finally took some measure of responsibility for the murder of Barry Van Treese,” he said. “While allowing Glossip to plead guilty to the lesser-related charge of accessory to first-degree murder was a difficult decision for me, (and) more importantly, the Van Treese family, we both recognize that this path ensures a conviction related to Mr. Van Treese’s murder and gives us the best chance to secure additional prison time for Glossip.”