Richard Glossip.
(CNN) --
At least once a week, Richard Glossip's defense team connects by phone, sometimes to catch up and other times to strategize on how to save the life of the Oklahoma man in the death row.
Glossip, who has been behind bars for 26 years on a capital murder sentence, now has a tablet in his cell at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary and can use it to make collect phone calls.
"It's one of the scariest things, especially if you're an innocent person, to know that your life is going to be taken for something you have nothing to do with," Glossip told CNN, in an exclusive interview during one of those calls. telephone.
Last month, Glossip learned of his ninth execution date: May 18.
Over the years, he has received a series of pardons and stays, with this latest date coming at the behest of newly elected Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond.
“It is my responsibility to ensure that we are responding appropriately to all of the evidence that has been presented through the conviction and incarceration of Mr. Glossip,” Drummond said in a statement.
"The circumstances surrounding this case require a thorough review."
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Drummond's office appointed an independent special prosecutor to lead that review.
Glossip's lawyer, Don Knight, called it "hugely significant" and said it was "the right thing to do".
"Anyone looking at this case has to come to the same result and that's the sole purpose, to make sure everyone sees the truth," Glossip said.
In August, Oklahoma said it planned to execute 24 death row inmates through 2024, despite cries from critics and experts who pointed not only to outstanding questions about the mental fitness or possible innocence of some, but also to the state's recent history. of failed lethal injections.
In recent weeks, the state adjusted that rate to about one man every 60 days at Drummond's request, citing a burden on the corrections department.
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Convicted of ordering a murder
Glossip, a former motel manager, was convicted of ordering the 1997 murder of his boss, Barry Van Treese.
Another employee, Justin Sneed, then 19, admitted to killing Van Treese with a baseball bat in Oklahoma City.
But prosecutors told jurors that Sneed did it in a murder-for-hire plot devised by Glossip.
Sneed received a life sentence in exchange for his testimony against Glossip.
Glossip has always maintained his innocence.
Richard Glossip speaks to CNN affiliate KFOR in July 2015. (KFOR)
Glossip was first found guilty and sentenced in 1998, but it was overturned in 2001 due to ineffective defense counsel.
He was convicted again in 2004 and again sentenced to death.
“You yell it and you yell it, and finally somebody stands up and says, 'There's something to this,'” Glossip says of his attorney Knight, who began representing him in 2015.
That year, an hour passed after Glossip's execution when the governor issued a stay based on the constitutionality of the state's execution protocols.
Glossip has been on the verge of execution three times before, including being served three separate meals last year, according to his lawyer.
Knight, along with his legal assistant Meri Wright, has experienced ups and downs in his quest to exonerate Glossip.
"It's hard not to feel emotionally attached to the case, but also to Rich himself," Wright told CNN.
"It is an extraordinary burden to try to save the life of another human being."
November 2022 marked another legal setback, when the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals denied a request for a hearing on new evidence in the case.
It followed an explosive 300-plus-page report, released by the international law firm Reed Smith, which concluded: "No reasonable jury hearing the full record would have convicted Richard Glossip of murder."
The report was commissioned by a bipartisan group of 34 state lawmakers and led by state Republican Kevin McDugle, who has vowed to repeal the death penalty in Oklahoma if Glossip is executed.
McDugle told CNN the report changed the minds of many of his colleagues who believe in capital punishment but want to make sure the state's death penalty process is fair.
"If you're going to kill us, do it fast. We're sick of waiting on death row"
New evidence discovered in case
In the past year, Reed Smith and Glossip's defense team have uncovered even more evidence that they say proves Glossip's innocence.
Among the documents is a letter from Sneed to his lawyer, in which Glossip's defense argues that he may have been trying to recant his testimony.
“There are many things right now that are eating me away.
There's something I need to clean up," Sneed wrote in the letters, which were shown to CNN by Glossip's defense and are part of an amendment to Reed Smith's initial report.
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Letters from Justin Sneed to his lawyer, in which Glossip's defense argues that he may have been trying to recant his testimony. (CNN)
In another letter, Sneed wrote: "Do I have the option to retract my testimony at any time in my life...?"
In a separate letter, shown to CNN, Sneed's public defender responded to one of his letters by saying, "I can tell from the tone of your letter that some things are bothering you [...] If you had refused [to testify against Glossip] chances are you'd be on death row right now."
The Oklahoma County Public Defender's Office, responsible for Sneed's attorney at the time, declined to comment.
"We always suspected that Justin Sneed really wanted, at some point, to tell the truth," Knight said.
"But from those papers, we could tell that even though he was trying to do it, his lawyer at the time was telling him, 'Don't do it.'"
What can happen next
The special prosecutor appointed by the state attorney general began his deep dive into the case last month.
There is no deadline for a report on the findings, but it will be "before the State Board of Pardons and Paroles meets, scheduled for April 12," a spokesperson for Drummond's office told CNN.
The office also said the attorney general spoke with the Van Treese family before ordering the review.
Van Treese's sister declined to comment to CNN for this story.
Meanwhile, Glossip is still waiting.
He said that he has made peace with his situation and tries to achieve something every day.
Write poetry.
With his tablet, he talks every day with his wife, whom he married last year.
He watches the services at her church on TV so he can see her on camera.
He said he's looking forward to their first anniversary, which he wouldn't have been able to celebrate if this latest delay hadn't happened.
And pray that more people will hear her cries of innocence.
“I've been through this many times,” Glossip said.
“It's still scary, it's always going to be scary until they finally open this door and let me go, or they put this out of my mind completely, so I don't have to worry about, 'Am I going to get killed next time?
month?
Or the month after that?
When does time finally run out?'”
death rowdeath penalty
