In 1981, state lawmakers reinstated the death penalty in Ohio.
More than 40 years later, dozens of the politicians who voted on the now-law – both yes and no votes – say the capital punishment system in Ohio is broken and ought to be repealed.
Of 44 surviving lawmakers who could be reached, 39 said they support repeal, according to University of Akron law professor Marge Koosed, who has been interviewing them while they’re still alive as part of an advocacy campaign to end the death penalty here. Twenty-seven went further, signing a letter calling on lawmakers to do so.
In broad terms, Ohio only allows for the death penalty for murder when prosecutors can demonstrate different kinds of “aggravating” circumstances like violence against a minor, sex crimes, slaughter of law enforcement and others.
The 27 former lawmakers signed onto a letter stating that death penalty trials, appeals and executions are far more expensive than lifelong prison sentences, citing state research. Black people are overrepresented on death row (about 55%) compared to the statewide population (about 13%). And sometimes, they say, the likelihood of a death sentence versus life in prison depends more on county geography and local politics than the underlying crime.
And they say capital punishment carries too long a history of mistakes for an irreversible decision from the state – Ohio in 1984 sentenced a man to death who was later acquitted after two others confessed to a double homicide. Eleven people sentenced to death have been exonerated, according to advocacy group Ohioans to Stop Executions, after serving an average of 21 years in prison for crimes they didn’t commit.
“In short, we understand this broken death penalty system’s grievous flaws, its unintended consequences, and its failure to achieve the benefits we had intended,” many of the now-dissenters said in a recent joint letter to state lawmakers.
“While some of us opposed enactment of the death penalty in 1981 and others of us supported it, today we are united in our belief that it is time to retire Ohio’s death penalty.”
Among those on death row, 17 are from Cuyahoga County, the most of any in Ohio. Seven come from Summit County and nine from Franklin County.
Prominent politicians say they changed their minds on the death penalty
It started with Paul Pfeifer, a Republican and self-described “principal architect” of the death penalty in Ohio as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, who has been arguing for more than a decade that Ohio should repeal the law he drafted. Pfeifer, who later reviewed death penalty cases as a Supreme Court justice, called the system a “death lottery” in a law review.
“The statute which we believed in 1981 was carefully crafted, limited in reach, and targeting just the ‘worst of the worst,’ has fallen far short in so many ways,” he said.
A decade later, Bob Taft, who oversaw 26 executions while serving as governor from 1999 to 2007, came out against the law. He did so in a mea culpa styled op-ed alongside former attorneys general Lee Fisher and Jim Petro, also state lawmakers in 1981. They all described a “broken and incredibly costly system that fails to protect or aid us in any way.”
Their emerging opposition got Marge Koosed, a professor of criminal law and procedure at the University of Akron and vocal opponent of the death penalty, thinking: If they all believe it should be repealed, what about the people who wrote the law?
She then went about the shoeleather, journalistic effort of calling all the former lawmakers (Ohio’s general assembly is comprised of 99 house representatives and 33 senators) to see what they think in hindsight.
Of the 44 she spoke with, all but 5 said they think the current law should be repealed.
Some expressed philosophical objections to capital punishment, she said. Others said it’s the practical problems with the law like its uncertainties, cost, and extended timelines.
“I think it’s really revealing that so many of those legislators who dealt with this issue, struggled with it for years, have come to the conclusion that we can’t keep doing it,” Koosed said in an interview.
“That what they brought was not what they expected and surely is not doing any benefit to the state to keep.”
Notably, both Republican Gov. Mike DeWine and his predecessor, John Kasich, voted for the death penalty in 1981 as lawmakers and haven’t sought its repeal as governors.
Those on death row have been there for 20 years on average
Ohio has executed 56 people of the 336 sentenced to death since 1981. Some 121 others await execution.
Others have died, been exonerated, received clemency, or been found intellectually disabled or mentally ill and therefore ineligible for execution.
Those on death row have been there for more than 20 years on average, according to state data. They’re likely to remain there for now, as Ohio has been functionally unable to carry out executions since 2018, when drugmakers said they were no longer willing to provide lethal injection drugs.
DeWine has since delayed all scheduled executions, as lawmakers have stalled on either a repeal or legalizing a new means of execution. His term ends in January 2027. His most likely successor, Vivek Ramaswamy, hasn’t offered a clear position on the death penalty, according to the USA TODAY Network Ohio Bureau.