SEMINOLE COUNTY, Okla. (KFOR) – “My hope is that, you know, that he gets to get released soon,” Becky Lindsey told News 4.

Emotions were running high outside the Seminole County courthouse on Tuesday morning.

“My brother’s innocent,” Lindsey said.

Her brother, 45-year-old Robert Mitchell, has been in prison for nearly 30 years.

“Only communication we’ve had with him is writing him in prison or here at the county jail,” she said.

He was convicted of killing his elderly neighbor, Myrtle McGeehee in 1993 but has always claimed he’s innocent.

His attorneys point to DNA on a bloody sock and shoe that were never tested.

“He’s been there since he was 15 years old, and it’s wrong, you know,” Vanessa Brito, a supporter, said.

Brito, Lindsey and other supporters gathered outside the Seminole County courthouse Tuesday to attend a hearing for Mitchell that was postponed last minute until January.

Back in April, a Seminole County judge granted Mitchell post conviction relief due to the U.S. Supreme Court’s McGirt ruling because the murder happened on tribal land and Mitchell is a member of the Seminole Nation.

However, the state is fighting it. They filed a petition, wanting the judge to vacate and reconsider the April order granting post conviction relief. That was the reason for Tuesday’s hearing.

However, Mitchell’s attorneys asked the judge to put the hearing on hold due to motions that are pending at the federal level, where prosecutors are hoping to re-try Mitchell for the same crime in federal court.

Because both the state and federal prosecutors say Mitchell is guilty.

“Robert’s case, it just seems that the state just doesn’t want to let go,” Evan Haney, a family friend, said.

The federal trial is set for January.

Tuesday’s hearing in Seminole County was postponed to Jan. 11.