Richard Glossip pleaded guilty Thursday morning to being an accessory to murder after the fact in the 1997 killing of Barry Van Treese, after a murder charge against him was dismissed following his retrial. His sentencing is set for December, ending one phase of a case that has kept him on death row and then in legal limbo for years.
The plea came after the Supreme Court threw out Glossip’s conviction last year, finding problems with key witness testimony and concluding that prosecutors had presented testimony they knew was false. Glossip, 60, spent nearly 30 years in prison before being released on bond in May, and his name has remained tied to one of Oklahoma’s most scrutinized death penalty cases.
Van Treese, who owned the motel where Glossip worked, was beaten to death with a baseball bat. Prosecutors had long alleged that the killing was part of a murder-for-hire plot, and Glossip was sentenced to death over the case after his 1998 conviction. Since then, he has had nine execution dates scheduled, and at least three times he was served what was expected to be his last meal.
That long record is what makes Thursday’s plea so striking. Glossip has maintained his innocence for almost 30 years, but his lawyer, Don Knight, said he agreed to the lesser charge to “put this matter to rest.” Knight also said Glossip would have been released a decade ago if prosecutors had originally convicted him of the accessory charge instead of pursuing the murder case.
Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond said last year that he intended to retry Glossip on a first-degree murder charge without seeking the death penalty, and he said it was “an undeniable fact that he did not receive a fair trial.” Drummond also said “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.” Prosecutors now intend to seek a maximum 45-year sentence, leaving the December hearing to determine how much more prison time, if any, remains in a case that has already consumed nearly three decades.
