In a 5 – 3 decision issued in Glossip v. Oklahoma on February 25, 2025, the United States Supreme Court threw out Richard Glossip’s 2004 conviction for arranging the murder of Barry Von Treese and ordered a new trial because prosecutors allowed a key witness to lie in court and withheld crucial information about the same witness. Justice Sonya Sotomayor, writing for the majority, said that prosecutors in Mr. Glossip’s case “violated [their] constitutional obligation to correct false testimony,” and thus, he “is entitled to a new trial.” Justice Sotomayor was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Elena Kagan, Brett Kavanaugh, and Ketanji Brown Jackson. Justice Amy Coney Barrett concurred in part with the majority, while Justice Gorsuch did not take part in the case’s consideration.
The Court was asked to determine whether the prosecution’s decision to suppress material information about their star witness — Justin Sneed, who actually committed the murder — and permit him to falsely testify in exchange for a plea deal that spared him from the death penalty violated due process. Oklahoma AG Gentner Drummond already answered this question in the affirmative, confessing constitutional error and supporting Mr. Glossip’s request for a new trial. Today the Supreme Court agreed. Justice Sotomayor wrote that “had the prosecution corrected Sneed on the stand, his credibility plainly would have suffered. The correction would have revealed to the jury not just that Sneed was untrustworthy (as amicus points out, the jury already knew he lied to the police), but also that Sneed was willing to lie to them under oath.” She added that “such a revelation would be significant in any case, and was especially so here where Sneed was already ‘nobody’s idea of a strong witness.’”
