"Ohio Supreme Court Justice Paul Pfeifer wants to scrap the death penalty," is the title of Reginald Fields' report for today's Cleveland Plain Dealer.
Ohio Supreme Court Justice Paul Pfeifer, who helped write the state's death penalty law, now wants Gov. John Kasich to end capital punishment in Ohio.
But a spokesman for the governor said Kasich will continue to support the death penalty.
Pfeifer, a Republican, was a state senator and chairman of the Senate's Judiciary Committee in 1981 when the death penalty became the law.
But safeguards lawmakers put in place to prevent inequities have not worked, said Pfeifer, citing racial and geographical disparities in how the penalty has been administered. Pfeifer called the use of capital punishment a "lottery."
"It has bothered me from the beginning," Pfeifer, who won a new term in November, told reporters on Wednesday. He made his initial comments about the death penalty on Tuesday during his swearing-in ceremony at the court.
"To my surprise, the next thing I know I'm at the Supreme Court having to deal with these cases where people are sentenced to death under a statute I was very involved in writing," he said.
Pfeifer said an option for life in prison without parole was wrongly excluded from the earlier legislation. He said justices have never used the discretion the law gives them to look beyond legal arguments and use their own common sense to determine whether a person should be on death row.
With 157 people on Ohio's death row and the state executing people at rapid clip, the justice said it's too late to fix the system.
"I think the best answer is for the governor to just commute them all and that we do what Illinois has done and say we don't need the death penalty in Ohio any longer," Pfeifer said.
Alan Johnson writes, "Pfeifer: Revise constitution, end death penalty," for the Columbus Dispatch.
The Ohio Constitution is "a mess," clogged with casinos and livestock standards, and should be streamlined and revised, Ohio Supreme Court Justice Paul E. Pfeifer said yesterday.
Pfeifer, a maverick Republican who began his 19th year on the court this week, also said the death penalty should be abolished in Ohio and laws should be passed requiring more transparency in campaign finance.
And:
Pfeifer, the senior justice on the Supreme Court, also reiterated remarks he made Tuesday at his swearing-in ceremony in which he urged fellow Republican Gov. John Kasich to commute all death sentences to life without the possibility of parole.
Pfeifer, who as a state senator was a co-author of Ohio's 1981 capital-punishment law, said he now feels it should be abolished, primarily because it's being used for cases for which it was never intended.
"I think the time's right on this one. Politically it's right. ...You have Republicans in every direction. ... With that political configuration, it would be the most opportune time to seriously debate and discuss whether or not we have the death penalty."
Pfeifer said he will talk to both the governor and legislative leaders about his position.
Kasich faces the first execution on his watch Feb.17, when Frank Spisak of Cuyahoga County is scheduled to die by lethal injection.
Asked about the governor's response to Pfeifer's comments, Kasich spokesman Rob Nichols said, "Gov. Kasich supports capital punishment." He declined to elaborate.
The Ravenna Record-Courier has, "Ohio justice: It's time to abolish death penalty," by Marc Kovac.
Is it time for Ohio to consider abolishing the death penalty?
Ohio Supreme Court Justice Paul E. Pfeifer thinks so, telling an audience in Columbus Tuesday that the existing state law on capital punishment makes it “exceedingly difficult for this statute to be administered in a fair and just way.”
He added, “Gov. [John] Kasich and the governors after him, I believe, need to consider commuting all of those sentences to life in prison without the possibility of parole, and I think it’s time for Ohio to at least entertain the discussion of whether or not we are well served by having a death penalty.”
Pfeifer made the comments Tuesday, after he and fellow Justice Judith Ann Lanzinger took their ceremonial oaths of office. Both won new terms to the state’s high court in November.
Pfeifer said most of the 157 people currently serving on Death Row were sentenced prior to a law change that allows judges to issue sentences of life in prison without the possibility of parole.
And since the latter, few death penalties have been handed down.
He cited Illinois as a recent example of a state where lawmakers have moved to end capital punishment. Ohio lawmakers should consider doing the same.
And:
He added, “I encourage all in the Legislature, all who have a responsibility on this, to entertain a thoughtful discussion and to look at the question in a serious way. I think the time has come for us to make that change.”
Earlier coverage of Justice Pfeifer' call for repeal is at the link.
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