9 Ohio executions rescheduled while state appeals lethal injection decision
COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Execution dates for nine death row inmates have been delayed while the state continues its appeal of a court decision blocking use of its lethal injection protocol.
Nine executions were pushed back in a revised schedule released Monday by Gov. John Kasich. The next execution, of Akron child killer Ronald Phillips, was rescheduled for July 26.
On Jan. 26, a federal magistrate judge found the state's three-drug injection cocktail to be unconstitutional and stayed the next three executions. A three-judge panel for the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with the lower court and kept the stay in place.
The full Cincinnati appeals court last week agreed to rehear the state's appeal. A hearing has been set for June 14.
The state had planed to execute Phillips and Gary Otte, who killed two people to death in back-to-back robberies in Parma, before that date. Otte's execution was moved to Sept. 13.
The state has scheduled 33 executions through March 2021.
Other execution dates rescheduled Monday:
Raymond Tibbetts of Hamilton County, from July 26 to Oct. 18.
Alva Campbell, Jr. of Franklin County, from Sept. 13 to Nov. 15.
William Montgomery of Lucas County, from Oct. 18 Jan. 3, 2018.
Robert Van Hook of Hamilton County, from Nov. 15 to Feb. 13, 2018.
John Stumpf of Guernsey County, from Jan. 3, 2018 to Nov. 14
Warren Henness of Franklin County, from Feb. 13, 2018 to March 14.
Douglas Coley of Lucas County, from March 14, 2018 to Sept. 18, 2019.
The state is defending its new lethal-injection drug combination of midazolam, rocuronium bromide and potassium chloride last October. Magistrate Judge Michael Merz of Dayton wrote that that use of midazolam as the first drug will create a "substantial risk of serious harm" or an "objectively intolerable risk of harm."
Executions have been on hold since January 2014, when killer Dennis McGuire took 25 minutes to die after receiving a never-before-tried two-drug cocktail that also began with midazolam. Witnesses said he appeared to gasp several times during his execution and made loud snorting or snoring sounds.
http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index...scheduled.html
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