In our June Focus newsletter, we covered how Oklahoma’s attorney general has asked for execution dates for 25 men who have exhausted their appeals, but have valid innocence claims still unresolved.
The most well-known among these men is Richard Glossip, who was sentenced to death in 1997, convicted of engineering the murder of Barry Van Treese, the owner of a motel where Glossip worked. The actual killer, Justin Sneed, serving a life without parole sentence, implicated Glossip as the crime’s mastermind. Glossip has always maintained his innocence, and in February, an ad hoc committee of state legislators asked the law firm, Reed Smith, to conduct an investigation. The result is a 343-page report concluding that “Glossip’s 2004 trial cannot be relied on to support a murder-for-hire-conviction. Nor can it provide a basis for the government to take the life of Richard E. Glossip.”
One of the people driving the campaign to free Glossip is state Rep. Kevin McDugle, a Republican and death penalty supporter. After the report on the Glossip case was released earlier this month, McDugle vowed that if the state goes ahead with its plans to execute Glossip, “I will fight in this state to abolish the death penalty simply because the process is not pure,” CNN reports.
McDugle is continuing to fight for Glossip. Last week, he published an editorial in the Oklahoman explaining why he believes Glossip is innocent. And he is asking for support in his effort to free him.
We can help Richard Glossip by helping McDugle. He has a megaphone, and he’s using it. Please join us in supporting Richard Glossip and Kevin McDugle.