Victims’ Families, Retired Judge, and Former Correctional Director Publicly Express Support for Ohio Abolition Bill

Victims’ fam­i­lies, retired Judge James Brogan, and for­mer Department of Rehabilitation and Correction Director Gary Mohr have pub­licly expressed sup­port for leg­is­la­tion pend­ing in both the state Senate and House that would abol­ish the death penal­ty in Ohio. 

Dozens of vic­tims’ fam­i­ly mem­bers signed onto a let­ter sent to Ohio leg­is­la­tors describ­ing a ​“bro­ken sys­tem” that ​“fails vic­tims’ fam­i­lies.” The let­ter states: ​“In Ohio, the death penal­ty is a false promise that goes unful­filled, leav­ing vic­tims’ fam­i­lies frus­trat­ed and angry after years of fight­ing the legal sys­tem. … And as the state hangs onto this bro­ken sys­tem, it wastes mil­lions of dol­lars that could go toward much need­ed vic­tims’ ser­vices. …Ohio ranks 46^th out of the 50 states and the District of Columbia in pro­vid­ing vic­tim fam­i­ly mem­bers with eco­nom­ic sup­port. Instead of spend­ing mil­lions on our inef­fec­tive, racist cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment sys­tem, Ohio needs to pri­or­i­tize sup­port­ing all impact­ed by vio­lence. We urge our law­mak­ers to make the choice that best serves the inter­ests of vic­tims’ fam­i­lies. We urge them to repeal Ohio’s death penalty.”

David Taynor, whose broth­er was mur­dered in 2010, had been in favor of the death penal­ty when he entered law school, but at a press con­fer­ence on November 13 he described cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment as ​“sim­ply state-spon­sored mur­der,” accord­ing to the Cleveland​.com. 

Retired Judge and for­mer pros­e­cut­ing attor­ney James Brogan also expressed his sup­port for the leg­is­la­tion. ​“I do not oppose the death penal­ty in con­cept, but because it fails as an effec­tive pub­lic pol­i­cy, I sup­port cur­rent leg­is­la­tion to repeal Ohio’s cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment statute,” he wrote in a November 16 op-ed in The Columbus Dispatch. In 2011, Mr. Brogan was appoint­ed chair­man of the Joint Task Force on the Administration of Ohio’s Death Penalty, which pub­lished a final report in 2014 pro­vid­ing 56 rec­om­men­da­tions. Although ​“many of the pro­ce­dur­al changes” were addressed by the Ohio Judicial Conference, ​“the Ohio General Assembly has done very lit­tle to address the rec­om­men­da­tions which require imple­men­ta­tion by leg­is­la­tion,” explained Judge Brogan. He urged the leg­is­la­ture to ​“act now to restore fair­ness and integri­ty to Ohio’s crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem by repeal­ing Ohio’s death penal­ty,” con­clud­ing that ​“the attempts to fix the sys­tem have failed – it is time to end it.” 

On November 15, 2023, the Ohio Senate Judiciary Committee held its sec­ond hear­ing of death penal­ty abo­li­tion bill SB 101, at which 105 pro­po­nents of the bill, includ­ing activists, faith lead­ers, lawyers, researchers, and indi­vid­ual cit­i­zens, sub­mit­ted tes­ti­mo­ny. Mr. Mohr, who over­saw and admin­is­tered 15 exe­cu­tions while at the Department of Rehabilitation and Correction from 2011 to 2018, was among those tes­ti­fy­ing. ​“I do not believe that we are exe­cut­ing the worst of the worst…,” Mr. Mohr said, ​“I do not believe the death penal­ty is a deter­rent. Quite frankly, if I believed the death penal­ty was a deter­rent and would keep our staff safe, I would not be tes­ti­fy­ing today.” He explained that for exe­cu­tions he over­saw there was 30 years or more from the time of the inci­dent to exe­cu­tion and that “[t]here’s no deter­rence when that peri­od of time takes place.”