Skip to main content

Kasich temporarily delays executions of Phillips, Tibbetts

Lead Summary
By
Press Release-
In response to a federal court order issued on Monday which indefinitely stayed three executions scheduled in 2017, Governor John R. Kasich has issued short delays for the scheduled executions of the first two inmates – Ronald Phillips and Raymond Tibbetts.

Phillips was convicted in 1993 in Summit County for the rape and murder of a 3-year-old girl, and Tibbetts was convicted in 1998 in Hamilton County for the murder of his wife and the couple’s 67-year-old landlord. Additionally, Kasich denied Phillips’ request for clemency. 

[[In-content Ad]]

“The State disagrees with the federal court’s indefinite stay and has already filed a notice of appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Given the uncertainty created by the Court’s order, however, this brief delay should provide the Court time to resolve any pending legal issues,” said Emmalee Kalmbach, the governor’s press secretary.

The actions announced today will delay Phillips’ scheduled Jan. 12 execution to Feb. 15, 2017, and Tibbetts’ from Feb. 15 to April 12, 2017. 

Agreeing with the Ohio Parole Board in denying clemency to Phillips, Gov. Kasich stated: “Given the extremely brutal nature of the offense committed against an innocent 3-year-old child, I agree with the Ohio Parole Board’s recommendation that clemency is not warranted in this case.”

Add new comment

This is not for publication.
This is not for publication.

Plain text

  • No HTML tags allowed.
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
  • Web page addresses and email addresses turn into links automatically.
Article comments are not posted immediately to the Web site. Each submission must be approved by the Web site editor, who may edit content for appropriateness. There may be a delay of 24-48 hours for any submission while the web site editor reviews and approves it. Note: All information on this form is required. Your telephone number and email address is for our use only, and will not be attached to your comment.
CAPTCHA This question is for testing whether or not you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions. Image CAPTCHA
Enter the characters shown in the image.