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Taft Delays Execution
November 7, 2005 COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) - Gov. Bob Taft on Monday delayed the execution of a condemned killer who says he's innocent, the second time in two months Taft ordered a delay in a case nagged by questions over evidence. Taft granted John Spirko a 60-day reprieve at the request of Attorney General Jim Petro, who says he needs that long to test several items that Spirko's attorneys want reviewed. Petro informed Taft and Spirko's attorneys in letters Monday about his willingness to conduct the testing and his request for the 60-day reprieve. "I am a proponent of DNA technology," Petro said in the two-page letter to Thomas Hill, a Washington, D.C.-based attorney representing Spirko. "It is important to accommodate the use of DNA testing where practical and feasible." Petro, a Republican running for governor next year, said he does not believe the testing will be able to prove either Spirko's innocence or his guilt. "Notwithstanding, I believe that to the extent possible, all information should be made available for the parties, courts, and the Governor to use for what purpose they feel necessary," Petro said. Spirko was scheduled to die by injection Nov. 15 for the 1982 killing of Betty Jane Mottinger, 48, the postmistress in Elgin in northwest Ohio. She was abducted and repeatedly stabbed, then wrapped in a tarp and dumped in a field. Her body was found three weeks later. Spirko, 59, was convicted on the basis of witness' statements and his own comments to investigators. No physical evidence linked him to the crime. Authorities say he described details only someone at the scene of the crime could know. Spirko says he got the details from media reports and used the information to make a deal with authorities to gain the release of a girlfriend, who was held on an unrelated crime. Spirko sued in federal court last Wednesday to require the testing of the tarp, a cement block found near Mottinger's body and duct tape wrapped around her, among other items. On Sept. 8, Taft delayed Spirko's scheduled Sept. 20 execution to look into whether prosecutors presented inaccurate information at a clemency hearing in August. In response, the Ohio Parole Board granted an unprecedented second clemency hearing for Spirko, and on Oct. 19 voted 6-3 to recommend that Taft allow the execution to proceed. The majority said the claims of new evidence weren't enough to merit clemency. The delay is encouraging, said Alvin Dunn, an attorney also representing Spirko. "We're looking forward to having this completed and believe it will demonstrate that our client had nothing to do with this crime," Dunn said Monday. The tarp is important to Spirko's case because of a house painter who maintains his former boss on a painting crew is the real killer. The house painter, John Willier, passed a lie detector test last month as he repeated a 1997 statement accusing his boss, who is now in a Louisiana prison. Spirko's attorneys say Willier told investigators in 1984 that the paint-splattered tarp Mottinger's body was wrapped in was the one his crew was using. Chemical tests matched the paint to houses the crew worked on. In past court filings, Spirko's attorneys also questioned prosecutors' attempt to link Spirko to the crime through a friend. Prosecutors alleged the friend, Delaney Gibson, was seen near the post office the day Mottinger was abducted. But Spirko's attorneys say photographs and other evidence place Gibson with a full beard in North Carolina the day before. Witnesses say the man they saw at the post office was clean shaven. Last year, prosecutors dropped death penalty charges against Gibson in connection with Mottinger's death, saying the case against Gibson was too old. Ohio has put 18 men to death since the state resumed executions in 1999 after a 36-year gap. In 2003, Taft set aside the death sentence of Jerome Campbell over concerns about evidence presented to jurors. (Copyright 2005 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
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