Supreme Court set to hear arguments in high-profile Oklahoma death row case

The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments Wednesday in a high-profile execution case involving an inmate who spent more than two decades on death row, Richard Glossip, in which the state’s Republican attorney general acknowledged that the detainee had not been sentenced to death. a fair trial.

It’s a rare case that has attracted national attention, as even pro-death penalty Republican lawmakers have urged the high court to send Glossip’s case back for a new trial. “There has never been an execution in the history of this country where the state and the defense agreed that the accused did not receive a fair trial,” said a Republican representative. ‘State, Kevin McDugle, about the case.

Glossip, who has maintained his innocence since his arrest, was convicted in 1998 of ordering the murder of his employer, Barry Van Treese, owner of an Oklahoma City motel where Glossip worked. Although all parties agreed that Glossip himself did not commit the physical murder — another employee, Justin Sneed, pleaded guilty to beating him to death — the dispute in question revolves around Sneed’s testimony, in which, as part of his plea deal to avoid the death penalty, he stated that Glossip offered him money to commit the murder.

The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals overturned the ruling finding Glossip guilty of first-degree murder and sent the case back for another trial in 2001, finding that the trial evidence had been “extremely weak” – but in 2004, Glossip was sentenced to death again. after a jury trial. Since then, he has been executed nine times, had three “last meals” and endured years of legal proceedings, including a Supreme Court case in 2015. Glossip vs. Grossin which judges ruled that lethal injections using a sedative called midazolam did not constitute cruel and unusual punishment.

Glossip’s conviction was based largely on Sneed’s testimony that he was offered money to carry out the murder, but two investigations have now cast doubt on the conviction. One of those investigations, ordered by Republican Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond, found that the state withheld evidence that Sneed had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and prescribed lithium, calling into question his mental state – and therefore his testimony on Glossip. This new evidence led Oklahoma to conclude that “justice requires vacating Glossip’s conviction and returning the case to district court,” but the state Court of Criminal Appeals declined to do so. to do, writing that “Glossip has exhausted all avenues and we have found no solution.” legal or factual reason that would require relief in this case.

Now the Supreme Court will have the opportunity to hear arguments in this case, which will be unique as both sides are arguing for a new trial. The Supreme Court appointed a third lawyer to argue in favor of the Oklahoma Court of Appeals and its decision to uphold Glossip’s death sentence.

“I know of no other case in which the attorney general of a state agreed with the accused that the defendant did not receive a fair trial, and the court, the highest court in that state, “still continued to push for the execution,” one of Glossip’s lawyers since 2015, Don Knight, told The Sun.

“What the attorney general admitted was that prosecutors had information that should have been disclosed to Mr. Glossip’s lawyers before his trial, and that was not disclosed,” he said, adding that the evidence, which is now 26 years old. later, it likely would have helped the jury determine that Sneed was an unreliable witness.

Additionally, Sneed testified that he was given lithium “maybe for a toothache, or maybe because he had a cold,” Mr. Knight said, and the prosecutor “knew that it was false, but he did nothing and let that information go to the jury.

“It also constitutes a violation of Mr. Glossip’s due process rights in a case called Napue v. Illinois, which says that prosecutors, when they call a witness and they know that this witness is lying, they must and have the duty to correct this witness. This is all because prosecutors have no duty to win. They have a duty to do justice.

Mr Drummond’s office, when contacted by The Sun, declined to comment beyond his previous statements, in which he said he “cannot support the murder conviction and death sentence of Richard Glossip” and that he “does not believe that justice will be done”. by executing a man based on the testimony of a compromised witness.

An amicus brief filed on behalf of the murder victim’s family members says the family has an interest in having the death sentence carried out and that any further delay “would inflict enormous suffering” on them and asserts that the The matter is not before the Supreme Court. Court estate.

“At bottom, Glossip asks this Court to adopt the new theory that when a state attorney general personally disagrees with an inferior decision, that dissatisfaction trumps all other procedural requirements,” it says. the memoir. “This Court does not have the authority to give decisive weight to the opinions of the Attorney General over those of the OCCA – and there is no reason to do so given the trauma that any further delay would inflict on the family of the victim.”