Cold-blooded killer gets warm welcome from federal court
Today is the day Charles Lor- raine should have died. Instead it is just one more day in the 9,388 days that have passed since Lorraine earned a richly deserved but long-postponed date with Ohio’s executioner. That day was May 6, 1986, when Lorraine murdered Raymond Montgomery and his wife, Doris, in their Warren home.
They had hired Lorraine to do odd jobs around the house. Instead, he stabbed Raymond Montgomery, 77, six times with a butcher’s knife and Doris Montgomery, who was 80 years old and bedridden, nine times. Then he robbed them.
A succession of unsuccessful appeals since Lorraine’s conviction and sentencing on Dec. 9, 1986, have managed to delay justice. Two years ago, Lorraine was pursuing an appeal based on his alleged mental retardation. When that failed and Ohio’s Parole Board and Gov. John Kasich denied Lorraine’s request for clemency, it appeared that Lorraine’s fate had been sealed.
But his lawyers appealed yet again, claiming that Lorraine’s constitutional right to equal protection under the law would be violated because the state deviated from its protocol when it executed Reginald Brooks on Nov. 15.
Specifically, the state failed to review Brooks’ medical chart upon his arrival at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville shortly before his execution. Also, the state failed to document the expiration dates of the drugs used in his execution and the name of each drug was not called out as it was administered.
These were among the procedures approved by U.S. District Court Judge Gregory Frost when he authorized Ohio to resume executions following earlier constitutional challenges.
Irritation evident
Frost was obviously irritated by the state’s deviation from his order and placed the blame squarely on the state. He described the effect of his ruling as “a curiously if not inexplicably self-inflicted wound.”
Yes, state officials failed to follow the judge’s order to the very letter, and when taking a life, proper procedure must be followed. But these transgressions were arguably more individual oversights than a conspiracy by the state of Ohio to deny Reginald Brooks his constitutional rights.
Rather than issue a warning to the Ohio Department of Corrections that it should be more careful in the people it chooses to oversee executions and the training it provides, Frost chose to speculate that Lorraine’s rights were in jeopardy. He enjoined the state from executing Lorraine, then indulged himself by rhetorically washing his hands of any responsibility with his “self-inflicted” comment.
Frost further wrote: “This is frustrating to the court because no judge is a micro-manager of executions and no judge wants to find himself mired in ongoing litigation in which he must continually babysit the parties.” But micro-managing is exactly what Frost is doing, and the result will not only be the postponement of Lorraine’s execution, but a likely disruption in other executions that have been scheduled throughout the year by the Ohio Supreme Court.
Kasich and Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine will take their argument to the Supreme Court of the United States, as Trumbull County Prosecutor Dennis Watkins urged them to do. All are convinced that Ohio’s capital punishment law and the way in which it is enforced is constitutional.
For the sake of justice for victims like Raymond and Doris Montgomery and the loved ones they left behind, let’s hope the Supreme Court provides the necessary affirmation. Another 25 years, eight months and 12 days should not pass during which Charles Lorraine gets to enjoy that which he wantonly took from others — life.