The inmate "could long ago have ended his anxieties and uncertainties by submitting to what the people have deemed him to deserve: execution."
Akron child killer Ronald Phillips' execution 'too easy', victim's family says
LUCASVILLE, Ohio -- The half sister of Ronald Phillips' 3-year-old murder victim said the Akron man's death by lethal injection Wednesday was "too easy" compared to what the toddler endured before her death.
Sheila Marie Evans, Phillips' girlfriend's daughter, was brutally beaten and raped in the days before her death, which Phillips confessed to shortly thereafter.
Phillips, 43, died at 10:43 a.m. at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility's death house. Renee Mundell, who witnessed the execution, said there was no reason the family had to wait 24 years for justice to be served. Phillips' execution was delayed several times, most recently due to lawsuits challenging the state's use of sedative midazolam.
"Families need closure when they know that they have all the evidence that proves this person has done it," Mundell said.
Wednesday's execution was the first carried out in Ohio in more than three years. Mundell said she hopes it opens the door for additional executions to go forward to give other families closure. The state has scheduled 26 execution dates through 2020.
Executions have been on hold since January 2014, when Preble County man Dennis McGuire took an unusually long 26 minutes to die with a two-drug combo including midazolam. The sedative has been involved in problematic executions in other states including Arizona, Oklahoma and Alabama.
For Phillips, the state used another new combination of drugs: midazolam, rocuronium bromide and potassium chloride. Phillips appeared calm throughout the execution and did not show signs of gasping, choking or struggling as had been seen with McGuire, according to members of the media who witnessed the execution.
An hour before Phillips' death, Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction Director Gary Mohr said execution staff members rehearsed the protocol 18 times.
"I have confidence we're going to continue to do this in a dignified, peaceful, humane way," Mohr said just before Phillips' execution.
Death penalty opponents have called for Gov. John Kasich to postpone all executions until state officials make reforms recommended by a 2014 death penalty task force.
Allen Bohnert, a public defender who worked on Phillips' case, said Wednesday's seemingly problem-free execution does not mean Phillips felt no pain. Bohnert said officials administered the second drug, a paralytic, so soon it masked any ill effects felt by the third drug.
"Ohio once again experimented with a drug that overwhelming scientific consensus says cannot render the inmate unconscious and insensate to the undisputedly unconstitutional pain and suffering from the second and third drugs," Bohnert told reporters after the execution.
Phillips apologized for his "evil actions" to Sheila Marie's family in a final statement he made before the lethal drugs were administered.
"Sheila Marie did not deserve what I did to her. I know she is with the Lord and she suffers no more," he said. "I'm sorry to each and every one of you that lived with this pain all those years."
Mundell and Sheila Marie's aunt, Donna Hudson, said Phillips never contacted the family to express remorse for his crimes or seek forgiveness before the comments he made on his deathbed.
"God forgive him, but I'm sorry, I don't think I can," Hudson said.
http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index...ld_phil_1.html
I look at the death penalty based on the crime so understand your opinion I also agree with you he deserved the death penalty
Opinion
Ohio death penalty remains in limbo
Ohio executed Ronald Phillips last week.
Anyone expecting the resumption of capital punishment in Ohio to provide clarity on the issue was left with little new to discuss.
For death penalty proponents who felt, "It's about time," they could be speaking about the Phillips case in particular or in general about the state carrying out any death sentence.
Phillips was sentenced to die nearly a quarter century ago. He raped and killed Sheila Marie Evans, his girlfriend's 3-year-old daughter, in 1993.
Sheila Marie's aunt, Donna Hudson, spoke for many when she said, "Finally, after 24 years, she can rest in peace."
Phillips' death, at 10:43 a.m. in Lucasville, also ended Ohio's 3°-year delay in executions. Because it lacked any medical or procedural complications, the execution could begin speedier resumption of capital punishment in the state.
Ohio had put executions on hold in January 2014, following the use of an untested drug combination that left inmate Dennis McGuire gasping and snorting for 15 minutes in a 26-minute procedure. The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday denied the Phillips defense team more time to pursue legal arguments against Ohio's use of a three-drug drug mixture that sedates the body, then paralyzes it, then stops the heart.
Death row inmates in Ohio and in other states that have used such drug mixtures (or that are considering doing so) have sued on the grounds that even the uncertainty regarding reactions to the drugs can amount to "cruel and unusual punishment" in violation of the Constitution's Eighth Amendment.
Those who oppose the death penalty in all cases, particularly on religious grounds, can say Phillips changed in prison and reflects what is supposed to happen with incarceration: rehabilitation.
"He had grown to be a good man, who was thoughtful, caring, compassionate, remorseful and reflective," his attorneys, Tim Sweeney and Lisa Lagos, said Wednesday, according to the Associated Press. "He tried every day to atone for his shameful role in Sheila's death."
For Ohioans who say the death penalty should be imposed only for the most heinous crimes and when guilt isn't in doubt, the Phillips case checks both boxes.
Phillips did not deny his actions. Minutes before dying Wednesday, he gave his final statement, saying, "Sheila Marie didn't deserve what I did to her," and telling her family, "I'm sorry you had to live so long with my actions."
In denying mercy last year, the Ohio Parole Board called his actions "among the worst of the worst capital crimes."
Yes, Ohio executed Ronald Phillips -- a confessed "worst of the worst" -- on Wednesday. But nothing that transpired changes the debate about the death penalty in Ohio.
The governor still supports it and more than 130 men in Ohio's prison system await it.
The state has scheduled three more executions this year, and according to various media reports plans a faster pace -- about six annually -- over the next several years.
Expect exhaustive appeals.
What's cruel and unusual? Families reliving their worst nightmares for years upon years.
If Ohio remains determined to carry out the death penalty, then it must address a system that makes a family wait nearly 25 years for what it considers justice and peace of mind.
http://www.daily-jeff.com/opinion/20...mains-in-limbo
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