Death row inmate partially blames victim

The victim had lived in Columbiana County and was a YSU graduate.
STAFF/WIRE REPORTS
The way Adremy Dennis sees it, he is being executed over a mere $15, and the robbery victim is partially to blame for his own death.
"I told this man, 'Don't move,"' Dennis said during a pool interview from death row at Mansfield Correctional Institution. "I ain't saying it's all his fault, but why did he move? Every day I think about that. It ain't 'Why did you kill that man?' It's 'Why did you move?'"
Dennis is to be executed by injection Wednesday for shooting Kurt Kyle, 29, of Akron, in the head 10 years ago with a 20-gauge sawed-off shotgun. Kyle had formerly lived in Columbiana County.
At age 28, Dennis would be the youngest inmate put to death in Ohio since 1962. Dennis told a member of the Ohio Parole Board he regretted that the robbery netted so little cash.
"I'm about to get [profanity] killed over $15," he said.
Dennis, of Akron, insists that the killing was not planned and that he couldn't think straight because he was under the influence of drugs and alcohol.
"[Kyle] had to know I was drunk. I know he could smell it on my breath, smell the weed lingering on my clothes. If I come up to you and tell you don't move, you're like this [still]," Dennis said at the Mansfield prison.
A jury convicted him of aggravated murder, attempted aggravated murder, aggravated robbery and unlawful possession of a gun.
The parole board voted 5-3 that Gov. Bob Taft deny clemency. The dissenting members said Taft should consider clemency, citing Dennis' age at the time of the killing -- 18 -- and a troubled childhood.
Dennis would be the 15th inmate to be executed since 1999. Dennis also has a lawsuit pending against the state that claims the lethal-injection process in Ohio is unconstitutional.
What happened
Prosecutors say that on June 5, 1994, Dennis and Leroy Lamar Anderson approached Kyle and Martin Eberhart in front of Kyle's home. Kyle, a stock race car driver, was celebrating a victory at Barberton Speedway.
Anderson demanded money while pointing a gun at Eberhart's neck. Eberhart handed over $15. Kyle searched his pockets, prompting Dennis to shoot him.
Anderson, who was 17 at the time, is serving a life sentence. Ohio prohibits the death penalty for defendants under 18.
Dennis said he regretted allowing any witnesses to survive.
Marquita Dennis, 49, said she visited her son in prison recently and he expressed remorse for Kyle's death.
But attorneys for the state and members of Kyle's family have said evidence was overwhelming that the shooting was not an accident and that he has shown no regret.
About the victim
Shortly before he was killed, Kyle, a bachelor, who graduated from Columbiana High School in 1983, had taken a job as a salesman for Kobelco Stewart Bolling Inc., a Hudson-based designer and builder of equipment in the rubber and plastics industries. He had moved from Columbiana around 1987.
His passion was stock car racing. His father, Howard, brother, Craig, and friends were with him in his back yard on his final night celebrating his first pursuit-race victory.
"Kurt never hurt a soul," said his mother, Doreen Kyle, 64. "He tried to wrestle for a short time in school. He stopped because he said he could never hurt someone. He and his brother never had a cross word at all."
Mrs. Kyle said she and her husband do not plan to attend the execution but three of her son's friends plan to be there.
Kyle received a bachelor's degree in business administration from Youngstown State University in 1987 and also had a degree in advertising art. He was a member of First United Methodist Church, Columbiana.