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Dayton Daily News
Spirko Sees No Way Out Of Death Asserts Innocence Just Days Before Execution Date November 3, 2005
By Tom Beyerlein In an interview Wednesday from Death Row, John Spirko said his faith in God comforts him as he awaits a Nov. 15 date with the executioner for a murder he said he didn't commit. "Lots of times I read the Bible and think of Jesus in the garden before he was arrested," Spirko told a Cleveland Plain Dealer reporter who shared the transcript with other Ohio newspapers. "He knew what he had to go through. That's comforting, because I know what I have to go through. Jesus was falsely accused. Jesus was on death row. If they can do that to Jesus, what chance do I have?" Spirko's attorneys filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday seeking access to the tarp used to wrap the murder victim's body in order to test for DNA evidence that might point to another suspect. Kim Norris, spokeswoman for Ohio Attorney General Jim Petro, said Petro's office is still considering a defense request that the state test the tarp. Meanwhile, the Ohio Parole Board has rejected a defense request that it reconsider its 6-3 recommendation to Gov. Bob Taft against clemency, despite Monday's news that a witness who implicated another suspect in the killing passed a lie detector test. In the interview, Spirko, 59, reiterated his claims of innocence in the 1982 abduction and stabbing death of rural Van Wert County postmaster Betty Jane Mottinger, saying he lied about having information about the murder simply to win probation for his girlfriend on an unrelated charge. He also said he was railroaded by then-U.S. Postal Inspector Paul Hartman, who testified that Spirko divulged facts that only the killer would know during a series of jailhouse interviews in the months after the crime. There is no physical evidence tying Spirko to the murder. He was not a suspect until he volunteered information in exchange for leniency for his girlfriend.
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