The Supreme Court appeared split over an Oklahoma death row inmate’s latest bid for freedom during arguments Wednesday, leaving his fate uncertain.
Richard Glossip was convicted and sentenced to death for the 1997 murder of his former boss, motel owner Barry Van Treese. Although all parties agree Glossip did not kill Van Treese, state prosecutors said he orchestrated a murder-for-hire plot and paid a maintenance worker, Justin Sneed, to carry out the act.
But now, Glossip is asking the high court to weigh whether the state denied him due process by keeping evidence from the defense and knowingly letting the jury hear false testimony from Sneed, a key witness. An unlikely ally to Glossip is the state itself, whose Republican attorney general has admitted the inmate received an “unfair and unreliable” trial.
The arguments, which lasted nearly two hours, showed cracks of division between the justices on matters like the importance of new evidence and whether the high court could hear the appeal at all.
Glossip’s looming execution is temporarily paused.
Seth Waxman, former U.S. solicitor general under former President Clinton who is representing Glossip, argued Wednesday that Glossip was convicted on the “word of one man.”
When Oklahoma disclosed evidence in 2022 revealing Sneed lied to the jury about being........