Public Officials and Advocates Respond to SCOTUS’ Decision to Overturn Richard Glossip’s Conviction

In the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s deci­sion to vacate Richard Glossip’s 2004 death sen­tence, pub­lic offi­cials and advo­cates have expressed strong reac­tions. Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond acknowl­edged the sig­nif­i­cance of the rul­ing, stat­ing, ​“Our jus­tice sys­tem is great­ly dimin­ished when an indi­vid­ual is con­vict­ed with­out a fair tri­al, but today we can cel­e­brate that a great injus­tice has been swept away.” While main­tain­ing his belief that Mr. Glossip is not inno­cent, AG Drummond empha­sized that ​“it is now an unde­ni­able fact that he did not receive a fair tri­al.” AG Drummond com­mit­ted to review­ing the high court’s rul­ing and deter­min­ing ​“the most appro­pri­ate course of action to ensure jus­tice is secured for all involved” and that he would work with Oklahoma County District Attorney Vicki Behenna to deter­mine the next steps in Mr. Glossip’s case. ​“She and I will col­lab­o­rate togeth­er with our staffs and will review the evi­dence with fresh eyes and inter­view those wit­ness­es that would be avail­able to us to make a deter­mi­na­tion whether we should pro­ceed seek­ing again the death penal­ty, whether we should pro­ceed seek­ing life with­out the oppor­tu­ni­ty for parole, or if we should pro­ceed with a less­er charged crime.”

Oklahoma Representative Justin ​“JJ” Humphrey also cel­e­brat­ed the deci­sion, not­ing that the case ​“encom­pass­es many, many prob­lems in our court sys­tem, begin­ning with pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al abuse and crim­i­nal mis­con­duct.” Rep. Humphrey fur­ther ques­tioned how Oklahoma’s appel­late court sys­tem, Pardon and Parole Board, and gov­er­nor ​“all failed to con­sid­er the over­whelm­ing evi­dence.” He urged that ​“this is not a time to stick out our chest and brag, but it is a time that we should humbly review how it is pos­si­ble for this to have hap­pened in the first place.” Former Representative Kevin McDugle, who has been a vocal advo­cate for Mr. Glossip, expressed ela­tion about the rul­ing, stat­ing, ​“I’m ecsta­t­ic that Richard [Glossip] has the deci­sion he got…I don’t think they have enough evi­dence to try him again.” Mr. McDugle firm­ly assert­ed that ​“when you get to look at all the evi­dence, you real­ize Richard Glossip should nev­er have been on death row.”

Brian Stull, deputy direc­tor of the ACLU’s Capital Punishment Project, in a state­ment, said: ​“Richard Glossip has been fight­ing for two decades to prove his inno­cence; today the Supreme Court assured that he will final­ly have his day in court.” Mr. Stull empha­sized that the high court’s deci­sion ​“reveals the error-prone and arbi­trary nature of the death penal­ty, and the dev­as­tat­ing impact of false tes­ti­mo­ny and wrong­ful­ly with­held evi­dence.” The ACLU, which filed an ami­cus brief in the case, high­light­ed ​“Oklahoma’s sor­did his­to­ry” of vio­lat­ing due process rights, not­ing that ​“time after time, Oklahoma pros­e­cu­tors have vio­lat­ed these prece­dents, despite repeat­ed notice that their actions were not in com­pli­ance with the U.S. Constitution.”

Anti-death penal­ty advo­cates have also weighed in on the Supreme Court’s deci­sion. Sister Helen Prejean, Mr. Glossip’s spir­i­tu­al advi­sor, called it ​“won­der­ful news” and expressed hope that author­i­ties would ​“sim­ply give him time served and set him free and not do the new tri­al.” She not­ed the age of the case as a fac­tor that might dis­cour­age pros­e­cu­tors from pur­su­ing a new tri­al. Don Heath, Chair of the Oklahoma Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, not­ed the sig­nif­i­cance of SCOTUS’ deci­sion: ​“If you just now dis­cov­ered that the state with­held evi­dence, you should always be able to chal­lenge that.” Mr. Heath added, ​“I think the impor­tant thing about it, oth­er than Richard Glossip may be a free man soon, is that the Supreme Court is not will­ing just to reject, out of hand, relief from a death row pris­on­er. They’re will­ing to con­sid­er it on the mer­its and look at the facts of the case.” Demetrius Minor, the National Manager of Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty also cel­e­brat­ed on social media, say­ing the deci­sion ​“reaf­firms the real risk of exe­cut­ing an inno­cent per­son,” adding that ​“the death penal­ty is the only act of pun­ish­ment that is irre­versible, and it’s prone to error. This should war­rant the con­cern of all con­ser­v­a­tives.” The ACLU brief sim­i­lar­ly con­clud­ed that this ​“glar­ing pat­tern of errors almost led to the exe­cu­tion of an inno­cent per­son” and ​“teach­es that the gov­ern­ment can­not be trust­ed to reli­ably, fair­ly, and equi­tably deter­mine who should live and who should die.”