COLUMBUS, Ohio, Dec. 3 (UPI) -- After an execution was put off pending an inmate's request to donate his organs, two Ohio lawmakers are calling for an end to capital punishment entirely.
Democratic state Reps. Nickie J. Antonio of Lakewood and Dan Ramos of Lorain have put forth a bill that would permanently end state executions in Ohio, though the measure faces steep odds in the Republican-controlled Statehouse, The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer reported Tuesday.
Their proposal comes weeks after Gov. John Kaisch postponed the execution of a Summit County man who was convicted and sentenced to death for raping and killing a 3-year-old girl in 1993.
Ronald Phillips was to be executed Nov. 14 but made a request his organs be donated to a relative in need. Without any precedent for the request, Kaisch postponed the execution for a year to investigate whether such an act would be possible.
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Ohio, like many other states, is also low on its stock of the drug pentobarbitol, after the drug's European manufacturer blocked sales in the United States because the company said its intention was not for the drug to be used in executions. Pentobarbitol is the first of three drugs used in lethal injections. It paralyzes the body's nervous system ahead of two drugs meant to stop the heart and brain.
Pentobarbitol has been the subject of court challenges by death penalty opponents who argue because it paralyzes a person's body, doctors can't say for certain whether an inmate's death is painless or if it constitutes cruel and unusual punishment.
Because it is no longer available, Ohio has instituted a new and untested two-drug cocktail, combination of midazolam and hydromorphone. The first is a sedative and the second is a morphine derivative. No state has ever used that combination of drugs in a lethal injection, the Plan Dealer said though Kentucky has employed it as an unneeded backup to the pentobarbitol cocktail.
