Former death row inmate Richard Glossip has been granted $500,000 bail by an Oklahoma District Court judge after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned his murder conviction and death sentence last year, clearing the way for his potential release from jail for the first time in nearly three decades.
Judge Natalie Mai issued the bond order on Thursday in Oklahoma County District Court, setting conditions that require Glossip to wear a GPS ankle monitor, obey a nightly curfew and avoid any contact with witnesses in the case.
Glossip, 63, must remain in Oklahoma and abstain from drugs and alcohol while he awaits a new trial in the 1997 killing of his boss, Oklahoma City motel owner Barry Van Treese, according to People.
Court records and his attorney indicate he will only need to post 10 percent of the bail, or $50,000, and the release process could take two to three days once that amount is raised.
Glossip has been incarcerated since his 1998 conviction in a murder-for-hire plot involving Van Treese's beating death at the Best Budget Inn, where Glossip worked as a manager.
He has long maintained his innocence, arguing that the state's case relied heavily on the testimony of co-defendant Justin Sneed, the motel's maintenance worker, who admitted to carrying out the killing and received a life sentence in exchange for his cooperation.
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Over the years, the case drew intense scrutiny from death penalty critics and legal experts, who questioned the reliability of Sneed's statements and the handling of physical evidence, CNN reported.
In February 2025, the U.S. Supreme Court vacated Glossip's conviction and death sentence, citing significant prosecutorial misconduct, including false testimony and the destruction of evidence, and ordered a new trial in the Oklahoma state court.
The ruling followed multiple emergency stays of execution after Glossip came within hours of lethal injection on three occasions and faced a total of nine execution dates while on death row.
His legal team has argued that the state failed to disclose key materials to the defense and that new information undermines Sneed's credibility as the prosecution's central witness.
Glossip's case has attracted high-profile attention from celebrities, lawmakers, and advocacy groups, including support from reality TV star Kim Kardashian and other public figures who have called for a full reexamination of the evidence, as per The Guardian.
