TAKE ACTION TO ABOLISH THE DEATH PENALTY IN OHIO

Fill out your contact information to write your legislators and urge them to abolish the death penalty in Ohio. 

More about the death penalty in Ohio:

• The death penalty has failed to deter violent crime. The Death Penalty Information Center reports that the majority of death penalty states show murder rates higher than non-death penalty states.(1)
• Capital punishment is not pursued with equity, and has been described by Ohio Supreme Court Justice, Paul Pfieffer, as a “death lottery...depending on where you happen to commit the crime and the attitude of the prosecutor.” Only 6 of the 88 counties put it on the table.
• The Death Penalty Information Center released a report in September 2020 detailing racial bias in regard to the death penalty.(2) In Cuyahoga County, 4 of the last 6 defendants sent to death have been black, and Hamilton County is among the top 2% of counties responsible for the majority of U.S. executions. Additionally, in Hamilton County, between 1992 and 2017, the odds that a black defendant accused of killing a white victim would be sentenced to death were 5.33 times higher than for all other cases.
• The risk of executing an innocent person is substantial.(3) In Ohio, there are eleven death row exonerees. Since the reinstatement of the punishment in 1976, the state has executed 56 people, which means for every five executions, one person has been exonerated.(4) This margin for error robs innocent people of years of their lives and missed time outside of incarceration as Ohio’s exonerees spent on average, over 21 years imprisoned,. False imprisonment also re-traumatizes the victims’ families, and leaves those responsible for the crime unaccountable.
• Following an 18-month statewide study and consensus process, LWVO adopted a position on the death penalty in 2005 calling for its abolition and a moratorium on its use. Violations of due process, bias against minorities, the unequal quality of representation for capital crime defendants, and the cost of the death penalty process led League members to the conclusion that Ohio’s death penalty should be abolished.
• In 2007 LWVUS adopted a national position calling for the abolition of the death penalty with LWVO as a co-sponsor of the position. According to studies of the death penalty: The death penalty is inherently flawed, and no amount of reform can make it an appropriate sentencing option anywhere. Due process of the accused is often violated. Capital punishment is systematically biased against minorities.

1 https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/facts-and-research/murder-rates/murder-rate-of-death-penalty-states-compared-to-non-death-penalty-states

2 https://files.deathpenaltyinfo.org/documents/reports/Enduring-Injustice-Race-and-the-Death-Penalty-2020.pdf

3 https://ejusa.org/resource/innocent-lives-in-the-balance/

4 https://otse.org/issues/innocence-wrongful-convictions/

Organization Name
Org Address Line 1
Org City, Org State Org Zip

Get in touch!  Org Email or Org Phone