Ohio man resentenced to death in fatal beating

CINCINNATI (AP) — A man has been sentenced to the death penalty a second time for beating a woman to death with a baseball bat in Cincinnati 15 years ago.

A judge today accepted last month’s recommendation from a jury that 33-three-year-old Rayshawn Johnson should die for the crime.

Johnson was convicted and sentenced in 1998 for murdering his 29-year-old neighbor Shanon Marks in Cincinnati. But a federal court threw out the sentence, saying his lawyers didn’t fully investigate Johnson’s abusive childhood.

Jurors in the resentencing trial were not told that Johnson had previously received a death sentence.

Authorities said he hit Marks multiple times with the bat after breaking into her home on Nov. 12, 1997.

Johnson’s attorney says the sentence will be appealed.