Saturday, March 24, 2018
Staff report
WARREN
A judge has ruled that convicted Howland murderer Nasser Hamad cannot be released from state prison despite having a serious illness.
The brother and attorney for Hamad told Judge Ronald Rice, who presided over Hamad’s aggravated- murder case, that Hamad was diagnosed in January with terminal kidney cancer and should be released from prison.
But Judge Rice ruled that such a request should have been made to the governor, and noted that Hamad still would be ineligible due to his sentence for aggravated murder. Hamad was sentenced to 36 years to life in prison in November for killing two young men and injuring three other people who came to his house near the Eastwood Mall on state Route 46 in Howland on Feb. 25, 2017.
Hamad’s brother, Ahmad “Mike” Hamad, said in an affidavit that Nasser Hamad, 48, has renal cell carcinoma, and the cancer has metastasized to his lungs. Atty. Geoffrey Oglesby of Sandusky, one of Hamad’s attorneys, filed the motion. It cited Ohio law that allows a dying prisoner to be released “as if on parole” if the inmate is in “imminent danger of death,” meaning likely to die within six months.
The filing acknowledges that Hamad is not eligible under current Ohio law for this type of release because he was convicted of aggravated murder, but Oglesby says that part of Ohio law is “unconstitutional and violates the prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment.”