Emails Reveal Oklahoma Attorney General Agreed to Release Richard Glossip
Caroline MolloyTwo years before the U.S. Supreme Court vacated Richard Glossip’s conviction and death sentence, Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond sent an email to Glossip’s attorney, agreeing to a plan for Glossip’s release should a court rule in his favor.
“Once the conviction is vacated,” Glossip’s attorney Don Knight wrote to Drummond on April 1, 2023, the state would bring a new charge against his client: “a single count of being an Accessory After the Fact.” Glossip “will plead guilty to this charge” and be given credit for time served. Under the terms, Glossip would be entitled to immediate release.
“We are in agreement,” Drummond replied.
Instead of following through with the agreement, Drummond, a Republican who is currently running for governor, reversed course and announced in June that Oklahoma would again prosecute Glossip for first degree murder in the 1997 death of motel owner Barry Van Treese.
The email exchange was filed as part of an unusual motion by Glossip’s defense team in Oklahoma County District Court on Wednesday. The filing asks the court to enforce the previous agreement, which the lawyers describe as a binding contract.
“As Mr. Glossip remains in custody despite the Attorney General’s agreement that he should have been released at least two years ago, this matter is of the utmost importance and needs to be heard before any other matters are determined,” Glossip’s lawyers wrote.
Glossip was twice convicted and sentenced to death for murdering Van Treese inside Room 102 of the rundown motel his family owned on the outskirts of Oklahoma City. A 19-year-old maintenance man named Justin Sneed admitted to bludgeoning Van Treese to death, but insisted Glossip put him up to it. Sneed, who is currently serving a life sentence, escaped the death penalty by becoming the star witness against Glossip.
Glossip had originally been charged as an accessory after the fact for initially failing to give police information about the murder. The night Van Treese was killed, Glossip said, Sneed had woken him up around 4 a.m. by knocking on the wall of his apartment, which was adjacent to the motel’s office. Standing outside with a black eye, Sneed told Glossip he had chased off some drunks who had broken a window in one of the motel rooms. According to Glossip, he asked Sneed about his black eye, and Sneed flippantly replied, “I killed Barry.” It wasn’t until the next morning, when no one could find Van Treese, that Glossip realized Sneed might have been serious. Still, Glossip didn’t tell the cops right away; he said his girlfriend suggested waiting until they figured out what was going on.
The 2023 email exchange between Drummond and Knight is extraordinary not only because of its content, but also because of its timing. The agreement came less than a week before Drummond asked the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals, or OCCA, to overturn Glossip’s conviction.
Drummond had assumed office that January and almost immediately appointed a special investigator to review Glossip’s case. The review found numerous flaws — including that prosecutors had hidden key evidence from Glossip’s defense and that Sneed had lied on the stand — and prompted Drummond’s filing with the OCCA.
The email exchange reveals that Drummond and Knight had discussed Drummond’s plan and strongly suggests that the attorneys believed the OCCA would grant Drummond’s motion. Knight’s email lays out a step-by-step process for what would happen next. Once the conviction was overturned and sent back to Oklahoma County, Drummond would retain control over the case rather than returning it to the local district attorney; he would effectuate the plea deal.
“The parties agree that Mr. Glossip will receive a sentence of 45 years,” Knight wrote, noting that this was the maximum sentence for accessory after the fact at the time of the murder. “The State agrees to give Mr. Glossip credit for all time he has served” since 1997. He would also get credit for good behavior. “The parties stipulate and agree that, with this credit being applied, Mr. Glossip is eligible for immediate release as his sentence was completed in 2016.” In exchange, Glossip would agree not to sue the state for anything related to his “arrest and incarceration.”
Knight told Drummond that he would send a document memorializing the full terms of their deal. “If I have misstated anything, or left anything out of this agreement, please let me know so I can be sure to include it,” Knight wrote. Drummond offered no notes, simply replying that the two were in agreement.
But in a shocking move, the OCCA rejected Drummond’s motion, setting Glossip up for yet another execution date. Drummond then took the unprecedented step of urging the Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board to intervene, writing in a letter that, while he believed that Glossip is guilty of being an accessory, the record “does not support that he is guilty of first-degree murder beyond a reasonable doubt.” Testifying at Glossip’s clemency hearing in April 2023, Drummond said, “I’m not aware of any time in our history that an attorney general has appeared before this board and argued for clemency. I’m also not aware of any time in the history of Oklahoma when justice would require it.”
Despite Drummond’s pleas, the Board rejected Glossip’s clemency bid. With Glossip’s execution just weeks away, Drummond joined the defense attorneys in asking the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene. The court halted Glossip’s execution and agreed to review his conviction. In February, the justices ruled in Glossip’s favor, agreeing that prosecutorial misconduct had tainted the case and that Sneed was not credible.
In the wake of the ruling, Drummond made the rounds, boasting about his success before the high court. Asked at a press conference how he might resolve the case, Drummond said, “everything is on the table; a jury trial, all the way down,” but noted it “would be difficult” to retry Glossip after so many years.
Given his public posture, there was every reason to expect that once the case returned to Oklahoma County, Drummond would seek to resolve it — even without a previous agreement. But instead, he did an about-face, announcing in June that the state would seek another first-degree murder conviction for Glossip.
