Richard Glossip Pleads Guilty To Lesser Charge As Prosecutors Drop Original Homicide Case

From a 1997 motel killing to a 2026 guilty plea

Barry Van Treese owned a budget motel in Oklahoma City. In 1997, he was beaten to death with a baseball bat. Justin Sneed, a maintenance worker at the motel, admitted to the killing — and told police and later a jury that Richard Glossip, the motel's manager, paid him $10,000 to do it.

Glossip was tried and convicted of first-degree murder in 1998 and sentenced to death. That conviction was overturned in 2001 over ineffective defense counsel. Oklahoma retried him, convicted him again in 2004, and sentenced him to death a second time.

Over the next two decades, Oklahoma scheduled nine execution dates for Glossip. He was served three separate "last meals." In 2015, his execution was called off at the last minute after officials discovered the state had received the wrong lethal injection drug — a mix-up that triggered a nearly seven-year pause on executions statewide.

The case kept drawing scrutiny. In 2023, Attorney General Gentner Drummond took the unusual step of asking courts to throw out Glossip's conviction, telling the court the evidence "does not support that he is guilty of first degree murder beyond a reasonable doubt." Oklahoma's appeals court refused; the U.S. Supreme Court stepped in and granted a stay of execution in May 2023.

On February 25, 2025, the Supreme Court ruled 5-3 that prosecutors had violated their constitutional duty to correct false testimony from Sneed and had withheld evidence — including that Sneed was being treated for bipolar disorder — from Glossip's defense. The Court ordered a new trial.

Glossip was released on $500,000 bond in May 2026, fitted with a GPS monitor, after Judge Natalie Mai ruled Oklahoma's constitution did not allow her to deny him bail. A third trial, originally set for late September, was pushed to December 7. On November 12, 2026, at what was supposed to be a pretrial hearing, Glossip pleaded guilty to accessory to first-degree murder after the fact. Prosecutors dropped the original murder charge.

Who's who in the Van Treese case

Richard Glossip, now 63, managed the Oklahoma City motel where Van Treese was killed. He has spent nearly 30 years in custody — most of it on death row — while maintaining he had nothing to do with the killing.

Barry Van Treese owned the motel and employed both Glossip and Sneed. He was the victim of the 1997 beating that prosecutors have called a murder-for-hire scheme.

Justin Sneed worked maintenance at the motel. He admitted to beating Van Treese to death and testified against Glossip in exchange for a sentence of life without parole. He has never publicly recanted that testimony, though Glossip's legal team has produced witnesses and handwritten notes suggesting he considered doing so.

Gentner Drummond, Oklahoma's Attorney General, inherited the case and ultimately both tried to vacate Glossip's conviction and negotiated the plea that replaced it. Don Knight has represented Glossip for years and argued his case publicly, including directly to the U.S. Supreme Court. Judge Natalie Mai set Glossip's bond and will decide his sentence next month. Kim Kardashian, who has advocated for Glossip's case, helped fund his bond in May.

"After 30 years, after nine execution dates, and three last meals, the state has finally admitted they do not have enough evidence to convict Richard Glossip of first-degree murder." — Don Knight, Glossip's attorney, to CNN

What the charges and rulings actually mean

The charge Oklahoma dropped — first-degree murder — alleged Glossip orchestrated Van Treese's killing as a murder-for-hire plot. It carried the death penalty and twice sent him there, in 1998 and again in 2004.

The charge he pleaded guilty to, accessory to first-degree murder after the fact, is a different and lesser crime: it does not require proving Glossip planned or participated in the killing itself. According to his attorney, the plea covers two specific acts — helping place plexiglass over a broken motel window after Van Treese's body was already in the room (which Knight says Glossip did not know was there), and not immediately telling police what Sneed had told him about the killing.

The Supreme Court's 2025 ruling did not find Glossip innocent. It found a constitutional violation: prosecutors let Sneed testify falsely and withheld evidence about his mental health treatment, which entitled Glossip to a new trial — not to a dismissal.

Sentencing is set for December 17 and 18 before Judge Mai. Accounts of Glossip's exposure differ: one outlet reports the Attorney General is hopeful for a maximum 45-year sentence, while another reports Glossip could be released or sent back to prison for as much as 15 more years. Either way, his defense is asking for time served — which would mean no additional prison time — while prosecutors say they will seek more.

What each side said in and after the hearing

Don Knight, Glossip's attorney, told CNN's Jake Tapper plainly what the plea meant to him: "After 30 years, after nine execution dates, and three last meals, the state has finally admitted they do not have enough evidence to convict Richard Glossip of first-degree murder," he said. "They never had enough evidence to convict him of that."

Knight was careful to separate the plea from the killing itself. "He didn't know there was going to be a murder, he didn't take part in the murder. The plea that he made was actually to accessory after the fact," he told CNN. In a statement, he added: "In 1997, had Rich been given the longest possible sentence for the crime he pled guilty to today, he would never have been on death row and would have been released ten years ago."

Attorney General Gentner Drummond framed the plea as accountability, not vindication. "Today, Richard Glossip finally took some measure of responsibility for the murder of Barry Van Treese," he said in a statement reported by CNN. "While allowing Glossip to plead guilty to the lesser-related charge of accessory to first-degree murder was a difficult decision for me, [and] more importantly, the Van Treese family, we both recognize that this path ensures a conviction related to Mr. Van Treese's murder and gives us the best chance to secure additional prison time for Glossip."

Glossip himself spoke briefly after the hearing. "I'm grateful for all my attorneys and all their hard work, and I'm grateful to you standing by my side," he told KCRA. Years earlier, describing life on death row to CNN, he had said: "It's one of the scariest things, especially if you're an innocent person, to know they're going to take your life for something you had nothing to do with."

What happens next

Sentencing is scheduled for December 17 and 18, 2026, before Judge Natalie Mai. Glossip's defense will ask for time served, while prosecutors say they will seek additional prison time; outlets differ on his maximum exposure, with one report citing a possible 45-year ceiling and another putting it at up to 15 more years.