COLUMBUS, Ohio – Amid a nationwide controversy over lethal injections, Ohio voters overwhelmingly say they favor the death penalty for convicted murderers, but many also favor non-lethal alternatives.
According to the Quinnipiac University poll, 69 percent of voters said the favor capital punishment for persons convicted of murder while 25 percent said they did not. That margin is virtually unchanged from a poll taken before a botched execution in Oklahoma.
When offered a choice, 43 percent of voters favor the death penalty but 49 percent say they favor two options for life sentences. Forty percent favored life with no chance of parole and nine percent favor life with a chance of parole.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio cited the execution of Clayton Lockett in Oklahoma in its call for a moratorium on executions in Ohio through 2015. Ohio has also experienced several troubled executions.
The Ohio Supreme Court Tuesday, meanwhile, upheld the convictions and death sentence of Anthony Kirkland, who murdered and then burned the bodies of two women and two teenage girls in Hamilton County between 2006 and 2009.