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27,503 signatures. Photo Ohioans to Stop Executions (via Facebook) |
COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Death penalty opponents on Wednesday called on Gov. John Kasich not to resume executions next week after a 3 1/2-year hiatus.
Retired Dayton-area Judge James Brogan, who chaired the task force, said executions should not resume before state legislators consider the 56 recommendations from the panel.
"This lack of action is disconcerting and will enable the core problems we identified to continue and potentially lead to wrongful death penalty convictions," Brogan said in a statement.
Executions have been on hold since January 2014, when
Dennis McGuire took 26 minutes to die using a new and untried lethal-injection cocktail involving midazolam, a sedative, and hydromorphone, a morphine derivative.
But they said earlier this year they have enough of the new three-drug combo to carry out several executions.
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Ronald Phillips |
Convicted Akron killer Ronald Phillips is scheduled to die July 26. Phillips was convicted in 1993 of raping and murdering his girlfriend's 3-year-old daughter. The Ohio Parole Board
unanimously recommended against clemency for Phillips in December, calling his crime "among the worst of the worst." The young victim's half-sister and aunt asked state officials to move forward with the execution to bring the family closure.
In a separate letter to Kasich, 17 former corrections officials and administrators, including three from Ohio, warned of possible errors with the use of midazolam, which has been used in problematic executions in Ohio, Arizona and Alabama. The group warned a disturbing execution could traumatize corrections officials carrying it out.
Rex Zent, a former Ohio prison warden and Department of Rehabilitation and Correction official, said execution team members often deal with stress and anxiety from carrying out routine executions.
"Think of the psychological damage when something does go wrong or when they think of the men who have been exonerated from death row," Zent said at a Wednesday news conference.
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