USA - Oklahoma. Parole Board recommends clemency for Tremane Wood

November 5, 2025 - Oklahoma. Board recommends clemency in Tremane Wood death penalty case

The Pardon and Parole Board voted 3-2 on November 5. The execution is scheduled for November 13.

Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond was at the hearing giving a case against clemency, but ultimately failed.

Wood, now 45, African American, was convicted of fatally stabbing 19-year-old Ronald Wipf during an early morning robbery with his brother, Jake, at an Oklahoma City motel on New Year’s Day in 2002.

He was ultimately sentenced to death, while his brother Jake received a life sentence, even after he admitted to being the one who killed Wipf.

The argument was surrounding who killed Wipf. In the end, the jury found that Tremane Wood did.

However, during the time of the case, Wood’s attorney admitted that he drank heavily and abused cocaine, ultimately leading to his license being suspended.

“We are grateful to the Board for carefully considering all of the evidence showing that Tremane’s death sentence is excessive and is the direct result of a trial lawyer who abandoned him and who failed to give the jury all the information it needed to reach a fair and reliable decision over his punishment. Given the facts that Tremane is facing execution for a felony murder conviction where he did not kill anyone, where the confessed killer received a life sentence and is now deceased, and where the victims have also publicly called for mercy for Tremane, we hope Governor Stitt will accept the Board’s recommendation and agree that clemency is warranted in this case”, Wood’s attorney said.

Wood’s family, including his brother Andre Wood, spoke publicly in support of clemency.

The decision now falls into the hands of Governor Kevin Stitt on whether the execution takes place. The last time he commuted a sentence was for Julius Jones in 2021. On Wood’s case see also HoC April 5, 2004.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWYXyUYtXy0
https://www.kjrh.com/news/local-news/pardon-and-parole-board-recommends-clemency-for-man-on-oklahomas-death-row