Post by pebbles on Nov 21, 2006 17:21:35 GMT -5
Strickland, Dann both leery of death-penalty process
Sunday, November 19, 2006
Alan Johnson
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
After eight years and 24 executions, Ohio’s death penalty is about to come under closer scrutiny.
The challenge usually comes from death-penalty opponents. But this time, it’s likely to come from the newly elected Democratic governor and attorney general. Both Ted Strickland and Marc Dann question the fairness of not the law but how it’s been applied.
During the campaign, Strickland, a former prison psychologist, said he supports capital punishment but is "troubled" by numerous cases in which inmates were exonerated after long stays on Death Row. He told The Dispatch several weeks ago that innocent men could be awaiting capital punishment in Ohio, which is why each case deserves a rigid examination before an execution.
Similarly, Dann said during his primary campaign that he spent a few sleepless nights contemplating his commitment as attorney general to upholding the capital-punishment law. He advocates a full-blown deathpenalty study.
Ohio Public Defender David Bodiker, whose office defends many of the condemned inmates, said he isn’t sure how Strickland and Dann will deal with the issue in office.
"There are some times when you’re going to have to take a leap," he said.
Strickland and Dann must make some tough decisions on policy, he said, because their Republican predecessors, Gov. Bob Taft and Attorney General Jim Petro, adhered strictly to the law, rather than questioning it.
Complicating the matter further, legal challenges to the lethal-injection method of execution are pending in Ohio and several other states.
By the time he leaves office Jan. 8, Taft will have held life and death in his hands 27 times.
On 24 occasions — from Wilford Berry, the "volunteer" and the first man executed in Ohio in 36 years, in February 1999, to Jeffrey Lundgren, the cult killer put to death last month — Taft offered no mercy.
Taft used his nearly unlimited executive clemency power to spare the life of condemned killer Jerome Campbell in 2003 and gave John G. Spirko Jr. five reprieves from execution, the most recent to April 17. Taft has yet to consider the fate of Jerome Henderson, scheduled for execution on Dec. 5.
In theory, Strickland supports capital punishment just as Taft does. What remains to be seen is how the new governor — who worked for seven years at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility near Lucasville, often counseling Death Row prisoners — will respond to clemency requests.
Ohio’s governor is the court of last resort in death-penalty cases. Armed with a clemency recommendation, pro or con, from the Ohio Parole Board, the governor has unlimited power to grant reprieves and pardons.
While Strickland has been extremely accessible for media interviews before and after Election Day, he declined to make himself available for this story. Spokesman Keith Dailey said he was busy with pressing transition issues.
Dailey said Strickland believes that certain crimes are "so heinous this punishment is warranted." However, he is "troubled that a number of people who spent significant periods of time on Death Row were exonerated after their innocence had been established."
Strickland will review each deathpenalty case closely and make sure that "every scientific tool and method available to determine guilt or innocence is utilized," Dailey said.
Dann, who upset Auditor Betty D. Montgomery, the former attorney general, in the Nov. 7 election, said during a debate last spring that he is "not a proponent of the death penalty on a policy basis," but is "absolutely committed to enforcing the death penalty, as it exists in Ohio."
He supported legislation to review the application of the death penalty, adding, "I believe it’s something we need to study and we need to study right away."
Dann stopped short of calling for a moratorium on executions, something governors in other states have ordered.
"I think it’s in the interest of all sides to get to the truth about the application of the death penalty in the state and so, as attorney general, I would advocate for that," he said.
Dispatch Public Affairs Editor Darrel Rowland contributed to this story.
ajohnson@dispatch.com
Sunday, November 19, 2006
Alan Johnson
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
After eight years and 24 executions, Ohio’s death penalty is about to come under closer scrutiny.
The challenge usually comes from death-penalty opponents. But this time, it’s likely to come from the newly elected Democratic governor and attorney general. Both Ted Strickland and Marc Dann question the fairness of not the law but how it’s been applied.
During the campaign, Strickland, a former prison psychologist, said he supports capital punishment but is "troubled" by numerous cases in which inmates were exonerated after long stays on Death Row. He told The Dispatch several weeks ago that innocent men could be awaiting capital punishment in Ohio, which is why each case deserves a rigid examination before an execution.
Similarly, Dann said during his primary campaign that he spent a few sleepless nights contemplating his commitment as attorney general to upholding the capital-punishment law. He advocates a full-blown deathpenalty study.
Ohio Public Defender David Bodiker, whose office defends many of the condemned inmates, said he isn’t sure how Strickland and Dann will deal with the issue in office.
"There are some times when you’re going to have to take a leap," he said.
Strickland and Dann must make some tough decisions on policy, he said, because their Republican predecessors, Gov. Bob Taft and Attorney General Jim Petro, adhered strictly to the law, rather than questioning it.
Complicating the matter further, legal challenges to the lethal-injection method of execution are pending in Ohio and several other states.
By the time he leaves office Jan. 8, Taft will have held life and death in his hands 27 times.
On 24 occasions — from Wilford Berry, the "volunteer" and the first man executed in Ohio in 36 years, in February 1999, to Jeffrey Lundgren, the cult killer put to death last month — Taft offered no mercy.
Taft used his nearly unlimited executive clemency power to spare the life of condemned killer Jerome Campbell in 2003 and gave John G. Spirko Jr. five reprieves from execution, the most recent to April 17. Taft has yet to consider the fate of Jerome Henderson, scheduled for execution on Dec. 5.
In theory, Strickland supports capital punishment just as Taft does. What remains to be seen is how the new governor — who worked for seven years at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility near Lucasville, often counseling Death Row prisoners — will respond to clemency requests.
Ohio’s governor is the court of last resort in death-penalty cases. Armed with a clemency recommendation, pro or con, from the Ohio Parole Board, the governor has unlimited power to grant reprieves and pardons.
While Strickland has been extremely accessible for media interviews before and after Election Day, he declined to make himself available for this story. Spokesman Keith Dailey said he was busy with pressing transition issues.
Dailey said Strickland believes that certain crimes are "so heinous this punishment is warranted." However, he is "troubled that a number of people who spent significant periods of time on Death Row were exonerated after their innocence had been established."
Strickland will review each deathpenalty case closely and make sure that "every scientific tool and method available to determine guilt or innocence is utilized," Dailey said.
Dann, who upset Auditor Betty D. Montgomery, the former attorney general, in the Nov. 7 election, said during a debate last spring that he is "not a proponent of the death penalty on a policy basis," but is "absolutely committed to enforcing the death penalty, as it exists in Ohio."
He supported legislation to review the application of the death penalty, adding, "I believe it’s something we need to study and we need to study right away."
Dann stopped short of calling for a moratorium on executions, something governors in other states have ordered.
"I think it’s in the interest of all sides to get to the truth about the application of the death penalty in the state and so, as attorney general, I would advocate for that," he said.
Dispatch Public Affairs Editor Darrel Rowland contributed to this story.
ajohnson@dispatch.com