Oklahoma Death Row Inmate Richard Glossip’s Execution Halted by Supreme Court.

U.S. Supreme Court Grants Stay of Execution for Death Row Inmate Richard Glossip

Hope for Justice Prevails

The U.S. Supreme Court has granted a stay of execution for Richard Glossip, a death row inmate, on May 5. This decision comes as the court considers two writs of certiorari in his murder case. Glossip’s attorney, Don Knight of Littleton, Colorado, is hopeful that this is one step closer to saving Glossip from the execution chamber.

“We hope that the Court will reverse the decision of the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals and vacate Mr. Glossip’s conviction once and for all,” Knight wrote in an email to The Epoch Times.

According to the order, the stay is issued pending the court’s ruling on Glossip’s attorneys’ request to hear his case, find Glossip indigent, and appoint him legal counsel. The order reads, “Should both petitions for writs of certiorari be denied, this stay shall terminate automatically.”

International Attention

The case has drawn international attention, with noted death penalty abolitionists and celebrities taking up Glossip’s cause. Oklahoma’s Republican Attorney General Gentner Drummond and several pro-death penalty state legislators have also joined capital punishment abolitionists in calling for Glossip to be moved from death row.

Drummond believes Glossip is guilty of a crime, but not one he would be executed for. In court documents, he wrote that Glossip’s initial defense was inadequate, and there is evidence of prosecutorial misconduct that requires his conviction be vacated and the case tried again.

“I am very grateful to the U.S. Supreme Court for their decision to grant a stay of execution. I will continue working to ensure justice prevails in this important case,” Drummond wrote in an email to The Epoch Times.

Support for Glossip

Talk show host Dr. Phil plans to broadcast his show during a rally on the steps of the Oklahoma state capitol on May 9. Sister Helen Prejean, a noted death penalty abolitionist, has taken up Glossip’s case, as well as actress Susan Sarandon, who played Prejean in the movie “Dead Man Walking,” and television reality show personality Kim Kardashian.

Placards used by demonstrators calling for a reprieve for death row inmate Richard Glossip sit in a hallway of the Oklahoma State capitol on May 5, 2023. Glossip, manager of a motel in Oklahoma City, and handyman Justin Sneed were convicted of the 1997 murder of the…