Attempted suicide delays Ohio execution

COLUMBUS, Ohio, March 9 (UPI) -- The scheduled Tuesday execution of Lawrence Reynolds was delayed after he overdosed on prescription medicine in an apparent suicide attempt, Ohio officials say.

The 43-year-old condemned killer "acknowledged to staff that he knowingly took the drug in question," said Julie Walburn, spokeswoman for the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction, The Columbus Dispatch reported Tuesday.

Reynolds was under around-the-clock watch when he managed to get enough of the drug to overdose, prison officials said. He was unconscious when found in his cell 11:30 p.m. Sunday.

Citing medical confidentiality, Walburn declined to say which drug Reynolds took in his apparent suicide attempt, the Dispatch said.

The Akron killer will be sent back to Ohio State Penitentiary in Youngstown to await the carrying out of his sentence, which Gov. Ted Strickland has rescheduled for 10 a.m. March 16 at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility near Lucasville.

Reynolds was convicted and given the death sentence for the Jan. 11, 1994, murder of his 64-year-old Akron neighbor Loretta Foster, the newspaper said.