Joseph M. Norwood
1717 S. Cheyenne Ave.
Tulsa, OK 74119
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
9/19/2023
What: Media conference to discuss dismissal of Glynn Simmons case
Where: East side of Oklahoma County Courthouse
When: Wednesday, Sept. 20, 2023
Media release: After 48 years in prison, Norwood.Law client Glynn Ray Simmons is set to become the longest-serving exonerated man in recorded U.S. history
An Oklahoma City judge has declared that Norwood.Law client Glynn Ray Simmons will not face a new murder trial after he spent 48 years in prison. Citing a lack of evidence and other factors, prosecutors chose to abandon their case and ask that it be dismissed, which Oklahoma County District Judge Amy Palumbo has now approved. Attorney Joseph M. Norwood will be holding a media conference to discuss the case on the east side of the Oklahoma County Courthouse at 2:30 pm on Wednesday, Sept. 20, 2023.
As a result of the dismissal, the National Registry of Exonerations led by the University of California Irvine says it will be entering Simmons into the database. That action would make him the longest-serving exonerated man in recorded U.S. history.
A person is eligible for the registry when there’s “a dismissal of all charges related to the crime for which the person was originally convicted.” Additionally, the dismissal must have occurred after new evidence of innocence became available that was not presented at the original trial.
Glynn Simmons was first convicted 48 years ago of shooting a liquor-store clerk to death during a robbery in Edmond, Oklahoma, and shooting a second woman in the head who survived. Prosecutors built their case against Simmons and a co-defendant almost entirely around the testimony of the survivor who by her own account only glimpsed at the perpetrators for a few seconds.
Simmons and his co-defendant were initially sentenced to die after being convicted. They narrowly escaped execution when their sentences were amended to life in prison following a 1976 U.S. Supreme Court ruling. His conviction was first vacated in July of 2023, and he was released on bond pending a new trial.
Informing Judge Palumbo’s decision to vacate and dismiss was an acknowledgement earlier this year by prosecutors at the Oklahoma County District Attorney’s Office that Simmons’s 1975 trial was conducted unfairly. They now admit that a critical police report in the case was wrongly withheld from Simmons for 20 years. That document contained newly available information about suspect lineups from the 1975 police investigation that raised doubts about who the star witness in the case identified as the perpetrators.
The attorney for Simmons, Joseph M. Norwood, practices personal injury, family, civil rights, and criminal defense law from his office in Tulsa. If you or someone you know needs an attorney who will fight tirelessly for his clients, call Norwood.Law for a consultation at 918-582-6464. We’ll deliver the same level of skill and commitment to you and your interests that we did to the fight for Glynn Simmons.
Two decades after Simmons was convicted, one prosecutor responsible for sending him to prison confessed to being “troubled” by the thinness of the evidence in the case. A second prosecutor admitted that attitudes toward the reliability of eyewitness testimony had shifted considerably since the 1975 trial.
Glynn Simmons first began corresponding with Norwood.Law after learning about how we had helped free a Tulsa man in 2019 named Corey Atchison. We’re also representing a man who spent 30 years behind bars but was set free after DNA evidence excluded him from a rape victim’s vaginal swab in Ada, Oklahoma. In all three cases, prosecutors presented no physical evidence at all and instead relied on a single eyewitness.
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About Norwood.Law
Joseph Norwood is a trial-and-litigation lawyer based in Tulsa, Oklahoma, who has 20 years of experience practicing business, personal injury, family, civil rights, and criminal-defense law. Owing to numerous high-profile and impactful cases Joe has successfully litigated, he has earned a reputation as a go-to lawyer when results are what matter most. He has secured multiple appellate victories for his clients and jury-tried and bench-tried criminal and civil cases in local, state, and federal courts in Oklahoma. If you or someone you know needs an attorney who will fight tirelessly for his clients, call Norwood.Law for a consultation at 918-582-6464. We’ll deliver the same level of skill and commitment to your case that we did to the fight for Glynn Simmons.
Links
- www.norwoodlegal.com
- Our application for post-conviction relief on behalf of Simmons: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23809450-glynn-simmons-post-conviction-relief-2023?responsive=1&title=1
- After 48 years in prison, Norwood.Law client Glynn Simmons is set to become the longest-serving exonerated man in recorded U.S. history https://norwoodlegal.com/case-abandoned/
- On TV, police impress with ironclad forensics. In reality, police rely on defective witnesses. https://norwoodlegal.com/on-tv-police-impress-with-ironclad-forensics-in-reality-police-rely-on-defective-witnesses/
- Before a judge granted him a new trial after 48 years, Glynn Simmons had to first escape execution by the state of Oklahoma https://norwoodlegal.com/before-a-judge-granted-him-a-new-trial-after-48-years-glynn-simmons-had-to-first-escape-execution-by-the-state-of-oklahoma/
- How Richard Glossip’s fight to avoid execution collided with our efforts to have another man declared innocent of a 1974 murder https://norwoodlegal.com/how-richard-glossips-fight-to-avoid-execution-collided-with-our-efforts-to-have-another-man-declared-innocent-of-a-1974-murder/
- OK judge grants new trial to Norwood.Law client who could become the longest-serving wrongfully convicted man in recorded U.S. history https://norwoodlegal.com/ok-judge-grants-new-trial-to-norwood-law-client-who-could-become-the-longest-serving-wrongfully-convicted-man-in-recorded-u-s-history/