Supreme Court affirms Trumbull County man's death sentence

COLUMBUS — The state’s high court has affirmed the death sentence of a Trumbull County man, re-sentenced for the 2001 murder of his then-girlfriend’s ex-husband.

In a 6-1 decision Wednesday, a majority of Ohio Supreme Court justices found that Nathaniel Jackson’s death penalty was “both appropriate and proportionate when compared with capital cases involving aggravated murder during an aggravated murder” and that an error made by the trial court was harmless and corrected under review by justices.

According to documents, Jackson and Donna Roberts planned the murder of 57-year-old Robert Fingerhut for months, hoping to collect $550,000 in insurance money. Roberts provided Jackson with access to the Howland home she and Fingerhut shared, where Jackson shot the victim multiple times.

Both Roberts and Jackson received death penalties but were later ordered to be re-sentenced after it was determined that the prosecutor's office assisted in writing the original opinion in the case. Roberts’ death sentence has been vacated twice.

Jackson’s legal counsel has raised numerous issues with the death sentence, urging the state’s high court to again vacate his death penalty. During oral arguments earlier this year, legal counsel for Jackson argued that the judge in the case filed essentially the same sentencing opinion, though he was ordered to file a new one one.

Jackson had hoped justices would remand the case to the trial court for another re-sentencing, with orders that the resulting entry be newly written and not copied from the early one and that other evidence offered by Jackson be considered beforehand.

But a majority of justices rejected Jackson’s arguments Wednesday and affirmed the new death sentence.

“Upon independent weighing, we find that each aggravating circumstance outweighs the mitigating factors beyond a reasonable doubt,” Justice Paul Pfeifer wrote in the decision. “The letters and phone conversations between Jackson and Roberts show that they planned Fingerhut’s murder over the course of several months. After he was released from prison, Jackson murdered Fingerhut during a burglary and stole his car. Jackson’s mitigating evidence has little significance in comparison.”

Pfeifer was joined by Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor, Justices Sharon Kennedy and Judith French and Appeals Court Judge William Klatt in the opinion.

Justice Terrence O’Donnell concurred in part, while Justice Judith Ann Lanzinger dissented. The latter, in a separate opinion, wrote that the trial judge should have considered additional evidence and filings from Jackson before issuing the new sentence.

“… The trial court here failed to comply with these instructions to conduct Jackson’s re-sentencing with the strict level of care that comports with the unique status of a capital case,” Lanzinger wrote.