Criminal Justice Policies for Adults

Ohio is among 38 states that allow executions. Lethal injection is the only method of execution in use today.

Since the death penalty’s re-instatement in 1981, Ohio has executed 24 people, all men.

Nearly 200 adults in Ohio are on Death Row, and more than half are African-American.

Progressives believe:

•Ohio should do away with the death penalty and replace all death-eligible offenses with life without parole. History shows that the death penalty is disproportionately applied to people of color and to the poor. Although African-Americans comprise just 12 percent of Ohio’s population, they represent more than half of the 192 people on Death Row.
•The increasing use of DNA testing to help confirm the guilt or innocence in capital cases is a positive development and should be expanded. Five people have been released after DNA and other evidence cleared them.
•Ohio should pay for studies to examine the root causes of racial and economic injustice in courts and prisons.
•Re-adjustment programs must be improved to help reduce the recidivism rate and foster an easier reintegration into society.
•Drug laws should be reformed to allow treatment, not incarceration, when appropriate.
•Drug courts and other programming for non-violent offenders should be expanded to help reduce prison over-crowding and costs.
•More precise research is needed to evaluate the long-term impact of drug courts.

For general statistics, proportionality studies, lists of inmates on Death Row and other information, Click Here for the Death Penalty Division of the Ohio Public Defenders Office.

Reports on the arbitrariness of the death penalty can be found at the Death Penalty Information Center if you Click Here

The death penalty costs more than imprisonment for life. An overview

For the Innocence Project, which is dedicated to exonerating people through the use of DNA evidence.

The ACLU’s latest on the death penalty.

Amnesty International’s Death Penalty Page.

The Death Penalty Pro and Con

Error Rates in Capital Cases 1973-1994