Man on death row facing execution soon despite brother admitting to crime
Britt Jones
Featured Image Credit: Tremane Wood Foundation
A man is waiting to be put to death, even though his sibling admitted to being the one who committed the crime.
Tremane Wood, along with his older brother Jake and two women, were charged with first-degree murder in 2002 for the murder of Ronnie Wipf.
Wipf died of a dingle stab wound during a botched robbery, and while Wood claimed innocence in the murder, under Oklahoma’s felony murder statute, prosecutors do not have to prove a single person killed the victim, only that they participated in the crime.
It was alleged that the two men arranged with the women, which included an ex-girlfriend of Wood, that they would rob Wipf and Arnold Kleinsasser after pretending they would exchange the money for sex with the two women.
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Before the sex could happen in a motel room, the men stormed the room and stabbed Wipf.
At the time, Wood was being represented by Johnny Albert, a lawyer who confessed to struggling with alcohol during his work with the defendant.
His family say this culminated in Wood being given the death sentence, while his older brother, who testified that he had killed Wipf, received a life sentence.
Along with claiming all but one Black juror was removed from the jury, who allegedly said she felt pressure by the white jurors to dish out a death sentence. She also claimed vital information was kept from the jury.
Little did the jury know that Wood was pressured by his brother to participate in the robbery, nor were they told about the profound remorse he had after the incident, his allegedly abusive upbringing and lack of support to help with his trauma.
The star witness, who is also the mother of Wood’s eldest son, told HuffPost she doesn’t want him to die.
So did the surviving victim of the robbery, and the mother of Wipf, but Oklahoma’s top prosecutor Gentner Drummond has allegedly been hellbent on delivering the death penalty.
Now, Wood faces his death on 13 November, but his family are campaigning for justice as Wood asks for his trial to be reevaluated on the basis of alleged dirty tactics from the prosecution.
They set up the Tremane Wood Foundation to petition for his sentence to be looked at again..
Sadly, the family lost Jake to suicide in 2019 in his cell after Wood became eligible for execution.
Right now, they are trying to prevent the loss of another family member.