Death row inmate who faced three executions is freed after conviction overturned

Alleged killer Richard Glossip has been given three final meals and nearly been killed on nine separate occasions during his three decades behind bars, but escaped death every time

A man who has spent 30 years on death row and had three different executions halted at the final hour has finally become a free man. Alleged killer Richard Glossip has been given three final meals and nearly been killed on nine separate occasions during his three decades behind bars, but escaped death every time.

Now, he has sensationally been freed after the US Supreme Court threw out his conviction. Glossip was set free on Thursday after forking out an eyewatering £480,00 bail set in preparation for a third trial to be held.

Under the terms of his bail he will need to remain in Oklahoma and wear an electronic monitoring device, but he is a free man for now. Court leaders at the Supreme Court ruled in his favour after his lawyers argued he had not been given a fair trial after being accused of having his former boss Barry Van Treese, an Oklahoma City motel owner, killed back in 1997.

At the time of the death, Glossip was the manager and is accused of having him killed to avoid being fired for embezzlement.

Van Treese, 54, was found beaten to death in Room 102 of the Best Budget Inn on January 7, 1997 by Justin Sneed, who confessed to killing Van Treese with a baseball bat in the room.

But Sneed, a motel maintenance man, claimed that he was ordered to do the killing by Glossip, who he said offered him £9,000 as payment to off him.

Sneed is expected to testify to this gain in the upcoming third trial, but Glossip’s team deny what he says, instead saying that Sneed killed Van Treese of his own accord during a botched robbery for drug money.

The defense continues that Sneed incriminated Glossip to save himself.

In its decision to order a new trial, the US Supreme Court specifically pointed to false testimony from Sneed and jurors not hearing critical information about his mental health history and credibility.

Glossip was first convicted and sentenced to death in 1998 before the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals threw it out in 2001 over issues with his lawyers.

A 2004 retrial saw him convicted and sentenced to death for a second time, which led to him coming just three hours from death on September 30, 2015.

He only survived after doctors in the death room realised they had the wrong medicine to carry out a lethal injection.

Now his lawyers say they will fight to make him a free man for good this time.

“Mr. Glossip now has the chance to taste freedom while his defense team continues to pursue justice on his behalf against a system that the United States Supreme Court has found to be guilty of serious misconduct by state prosecutors,” said his attorneys in a statement to Fox News Digital.

“United States Supreme Court has found to be guilty of serious misconduct by state prosecutors.

“Mr Glossip is deeply grateful to the many thousands of people who have expressed support for him over the years and now looks forward to the day when he is exonerated and truly free from this decades-long nightmare.”