In January, Ohio executed Dennis McGuire, despite arguments that he would experience agony and suffering due to lethal injection protocol. The execution took an abnormal amount of time, and McGuire gasped throughout the execution. The State of Ohio said that there were no problems with the execution. However, an expert doctor recently testified on the execution, stating that “this was not a humane execution.”
Executions in Ohio are currently under a moratorium, as Ohio studies lethal injection more. However, Ohio, like many other states, has made many attempts to find a safe and dependable execution protocol and it has failed repeatedly. The death penalty is a system broken beyond repair. The only true fix is to replace the death penalty completely.