Ohio death penalty update (March 2011)

The death penalty & related subjects have been back in the news a lot again. We presented a review of sorts back in January which this now expands on.

Illinois abolished capital punishment back on March 9th., with the sentences of all 15 inmates on death row there being commuted to life in prison effective as of that date. That was after a decade-long moratorium on executions in that state.

Ohio, Kentucky, and Indiana here in the Midwest are all still states with the death penalty –- Ohio, the day after Illinois abolished its death sentence -– executing its second inmate of the year using a new protocol and drug – the first time a single injection of the sedative pentobarbital has been used in a U.S. execution. That, in part, was because of the shortage or unavailability of sodium thiopental which had numerous states looking for sources overseas once Hospira, the Lake Forest, Ill., company that was the main supplier of that drug in the United States stopped making it last September.

That brought up other questions, such as whether the Food and Drug Administration would permit thiopental imports from outside the country even though there are no FDA-approved, foreign suppliers of the drug? The Wall Street Journal back in January had reported that the FDA had announced "it would permit prison officials to import thiopental to their hearts' content, but would not vouch for the safety and or purity of imported thiopental." Six death-row inmates from Arizona, California and Tennessee filed suit in D.C. District Court last month, claiming the agency has violated federal law by allowing states to import thiopental that has not been reviewed for safety and purity. ( Complaint )

During this same time 13 states were approaching the Justice Department requesting assistance on how to acquire sodium thiopental and/or whether the federal government would share its supplies with them, and the attorney for Georgia death row inmate Andrew Grant DeYoung was sending Attorney General Eric Holder a letter alleging that the Georgia Department of Corrections (“GDC”) appeared to have violated the Controlled Substances Act (“CSA”) by failing to register as an importer of thiopental and filing a declaration to import the drug.

Earlier this month, The Associated Press reported that Holder said in a March 4 letter sent to the National Association of Attorneys General that the federal government didn't have any reserves of sodium thiopental for lethal injections and was facing the same dilemma as many of the states. The Department of Justice, now, last Tuesday, confiscated for the first time nationally Georgia's recently-obtained supply of sodium thiopental, effectively putting executions there on hold.


Finally, a Reuters article appearing in last Wednesday's Chicago Tribune made the observation that "A perfect storm of cash-strapped budgets, newly elected governors and an increased use of DNA evidence threatens to smite the death penalty in an increasing number of states…"

The death penalty "stands a good chance of being eliminated this year in Connecticut, Maryland and Montana, where bills are wending their way through those statehouses," the Trib article quotes Richard Dieter, executive director for the Death Penalty Information Center, as saying. Repeal efforts also are underway in Florida, Kansas, and here in Ohio, although their success there are seen to be less likely. A Columbus Dispatch article last Wednesday noted that "death-penalty opponents have pushed for abolishment for years (in Ohio) but have made few inroads. However, the movement now has gotten a nudge recently when Ohio Supreme Court Justice Paul E. Pfeifer and Terry Collins, former state prison director, called for ending executions.

It should also be noted as well, though, that the Death Penalty Information Center also reports that New York and West Virginia were/ had been entertaining legislation reinstating their death penalties, New York's specifically being restricted to the intention killiung of police officers.