There is no question that the death penalty is a broken system. The problems with Ohio’s death penalty aren’t abstract problems in a report– they are embodied in the prison staff who carried out the suffocation execution of Dennis McGuire, the priest who witnessed it, the family who must endure another media storm. They are problems that can no longer be tolerated.
These problems are inherent to the death penalty and can not be fixed. OTSE knows that ultimately repeal is the only answer.
Until that day, Ohioans to Stop Executions asks you to send a letter to Governor Kasich– ask him to issue an immediate moratorium. How can we continue executions at the current pace when so many questions have gone unanswered since January 16?
Many of our partner organizations have joined us in the call for moratorium.
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- Read the press release and blog post on behalf of the ACLU of Ohio.
- Read Abe Bonowitz’s blog post, “Anyone Who Witnessed That Execution Will Never Forget”, on our partner Amnesty International USA’s Human Rights Now Blog
- Father Lawrence Hummer ministers to the Catholic inmates on Ohio’s death row and witnessed the execution of Dennis McGuire. Read the full account here.
- Read “Dennis McGuire’s slow, gasping execution is yet another reason for abolishing the death penalty: editorial” The Cleveland Plain Dealer, Sunday, January 19, 2014
- Read “Ohio’s justice should be more civilized: letter to the editor” The Columbus Dispatch, Sunday, January 19, 2014
- Watch/Listen to The Sound of Ideas: “Cruel and Unusual?”
Below – Watch WOSU’s All Sides with Ann Fisher: The Future of the Death Penalty: