Attorneys for Ohio death row inmate Kevin Keith have pre­sent­ed new evi­dence cast­ing doubt on his orig­i­nal con­vic­tion in briefs filed with the Ohio State Supreme Court. The Ohio Innocence Project has also asked for a new tri­al for Keith, sup­port­ing the claim that sup­pressed evi­dence points to anoth­er sus­pect who said he was paid to $15,000 to ​“crip­ple” the drug infor­mant who was the vic­tim of the shoot­ings for which Keith was con­demned to death. Additionally, Keith’s pub­lic defend­ers claim the pros­e­cu­tion know­ing­ly used false evi­dence about an eye­wit­ness iden­ti­fi­ca­tion that was used to link Keith to the murders. 

The defen­dant has exhaust­ed his ordi­nary state and fed­er­al appeals. Innocence claims by Ohio death row inmates are rel­a­tive­ly rare. Keith has stead­fast­ly main­tained his inno­cence through­out his 15 years on death row.

(A. Welsh-Huggins, ​“Condemned Ohio Killer of 3 Says He’s Innocent,” The Associated Press, June 30, 2009). See Innocence.

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