In an unusual move, the U.S. Supreme Court has halted the execution of Richard Glossip, an Oklahoma inmate whose execution had been scheduled for next week even though the state's own attorney general has said he deserves a new trial.
Glossip was convicted in 1998 of the murder of his boss, Barry Van Treese. Prosecutors claimed that Glossip instructed then-19-year Justin Sneed—a maintenance man at the motel where Glossip worked—to kill Van Treese as part of a complex murder-for-hire scheme. Sneed's testimony was central to the prosecution's case, and Sneed himself agreed to testify as part of a plea deal that allowed him to avoid the death penalty.
