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Increasingly, Ohio juries choosing life in prison instead of death
By Ed Runyan
WARREN
When prosecutors and attorneys for murderer David Martin spoke to jurors last week, they frequently thanked them for their service. This happens so much during jury trials, it becomes repetitive.
But starting this morning, when jurors begin to hear testimony and arguments focused on whether they should sentence Martin to death, the weight of their task may become more clear.
They will have to decide whether Martin’s crimes, including robbery, kidnapping and using a firearm, are sufficient for them to recommend to the judge execution by the state.
They will learn about Martin’s personal history — about the hardships he experienced growing up in Cleveland — so they can decide whether his background mitigates what he did.
In closing arguments several hours before the jury found Martin guilty of killing Jeremy Cole, 21, and attempting to kill Melissa Putnam, 30, Assistant Trumbull County Prosecutor Chris Becker told the jurors they had been carefully picked for this task because they had “middle of the road” views on the death penalty.
Becker, as he has in past murder trials involving the death penalty, is likely to stress to the jurors during closing arguments of this phase of the trial that it is their obligation to choose the death penalty if they find the aggravating circumstances of Martin’s crimes outweigh the mitigating factors.
But recent history suggests it may be tougher than ever to persuade a jury to choose the death penalty.
Over the past 10 years, Trumbull County juries chose life in prison without the possibility of parole both times they were given the choice between life in prison and death. In Ohio, juries gave the death penalty just four times in 2013. By comparison, the number was 24 in 1985.
In the decade before that, by contrast, Trumbull County juries chose the death penalty five times (1994 to 2003) and five times in the decade before that (1984 to 1993).
Statewide, 41 people were sentenced to death row during the past decade, compared with 114 the decade before that (1994 to 2003) and 149 the decade before that (1984 to 1993).
Some say the reason juries don’t choose the death penalty in Ohio as often today is because the Ohio Legislature gave juries another option in 1996 that they find easier to accept — life in prison without parole.
Others point to DNA evidence over the years that has exonerated people originally thought to be guilty of murder. Another reason might be the botched executions that have occurred in Ohio recent years.
Executions also are down, with the 2013 total in the United States at 39, falling from a peak of 315 in 1994 and 1996. The 2013 number is only the second time in 19 years there were fewer than 40 executions, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.
Recent history suggests that jurors will choose the death penalty under certain circumstances.
In 2008, a jury in Mahoning County sentenced Bennie Adams to death for raping and murdering 19-year-old Youngstown State University co-ed Gina Tenney in 1985. The investigation was a cold case for 22 years while Adams served a long prison term for rape. Tenney was Adams’ upstairs neighbor in an Ohio Avenue duplex in Youngstown.
But juries in Trumbull County decided against the death penalty for two convicted murderers, even though they both confessed to killing two people.
A jury spared the life of Louis Mann, who killed his parents at their Jefferson Street Southwest home in 2011. Mann spoke to jurors before they recommended life in prison with no parole. One juror said Mann’s comments made her feel he was remorseful for the murders.
In 2006, another Trumbull County jury chose life without parole for Jermaine McKinney, who killed a woman he knew and her mother in the mother’s Newton Township home in 2005.
McKinney’s defense attorneys said McKinney grew up on Youngstown’s North Side at a time when homicides were happening all around him. They said he was the victim of his parents’ drug abuse and neglect.
A poll conducted by Quinnipiac University in May found Ohio voters favor the death penalty 69 percent to 25 percent for people convicted of murder.
But when offered a choice of death or life in prison without parole, 43 percent said they favor the death penalty and 40 percent said they favor life in prison with no chance of parole. Nine percent said they favor life in prison with a chance of parole.