Oklahoma Judge Grants Bond to Death Row Inmate Richard Glossip After New Trial Order

An Oklahoma inmate who received a new trial after nearly three decades on death row has been granted bond, setting the stage for his first release from prison since 1997.

Richard Glossip, 63, was arrested that year in the killing of his former boss, Barry Van Treese. After numerous legal challenges, execution dates and last meals, Glossip on Thursday gained a path out of incarceration.

Oklahoma Judge Natalie Mai set Glossip's bond at $500,000 in the new order. It also requires him to wear a monitoring device and bars him from traveling outside the state, communicating with potential witnesses in his case or consuming alcohol or drugs.

The order cited a 2023 letter to Oklahoma's Pardon and Parole Board about Glossip's situation. That letter acknowledged that the record does not support his guilt of first-degree murder beyond a reasonable doubt.

Van Treese owned the Oklahoma City motel where Glossip worked at the time of his death. He died after being bludgeoned with a baseball bat, court filings show.

Justin Sneed confessed to physically carrying out the killing but claimed Glossip paid him to do it. Sneed received a life prison sentence and served as a crucial prosecution witness during Glossip's capital murder trial. The validity of his testimony came under question in 2022 after Oklahoma found evidence that prosecutors knew of his mental illness but did not disclose it in court.

That issue formed the basis of a Supreme Court case. The court ruled that the prosecution's failure to correct Sneed's testimony violated Glossip's constitutional right to due process and ordered a new trial in February 2025.

Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond said in June that the state plans to retry Glossip for Van Treese's death. His office will not drop the first-degree murder charge but intends to seek life imprisonment instead of the death penalty.

Glossip was convicted twice of capital murder. He has maintained his innocence throughout his time on Oklahoma's death row, where he avoided execution three times. Nine execution dates were set for him in total. In one case, correctional officers had strapped him to a gurney and started preparing a lethal injection before calling it off.

"Mr. Glossip now has the chance to taste freedom while his defense team continues to pursue justice on his behalf against a system that the United States Supreme Court has found to be guilty of serious misconduct by state prosecutors," Glossip's attorney Donald Knight said in a statement to The Associated Press on Thursday.

Glossip's wife told AP in a text that the couple were grateful for the court's decision. "We have been praying for this day," she said.