Trumbull County Prosecutor Dennis Watkins and Portage County Prosecutor Connie Lewandowski are mad as hell, and they don’t want Ohioans to take it anymore.

Their legitimate outrage targets this state’s misguided seven-year pause in carrying out the will of thoughtful judges and juries and the letter of Ohio’s law on capital punishment.

The two top county legal officers with a combined history of 70 years in criminal jurisprudence recently drafted a passionate plea to state leaders on the need to move the death penalty out of the mindless state of limbo in which it has languished since the last execution took place in the Buckeye State in 2018.

In the meantime, justice for all in Ohio has been placed on indefinite hold.

Specifically, their plea took the form of an eight-page letter addressed to Gov. Mike DeWine, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost, Ohio Auditor Keith Faber and majority and minority party leaders of the Ohio General Assembly.

In it they made this emphatic (all caps are from the original) appeal: PLEASE DO SOMETHING – EITHER OHIO ENFORCES ITS DEATH PENALTY LAW LIKE (Florida) GOV. DESANTIS, OTHER GOVERNORS AND PRESIDENT TRUMP AND PAST OHIO REPUBLICAN AND DEMOCRATIC GOVERNORS OR LET VOTERS DECIDE!”

In their letter, the prosecutors highlight that 29 executions have been carried out across 10 states so far this year. They point to Ohio’s history of executing 56 death row inmates between 1999 and 2018 and argue the state’s current laws are every bit as robust and constitutional as those in states actively enforcing capital punishment.

However, they expressed frustration over delays attributed to “obstructionist tactics” by special interest groups, pharmaceutical barriers and political opposition. “Ohio needs to move forward with its plan to address the impasse and give respect and deference to the current law,” they wrote.

Fortunately for Watkins and Lewandowski, they have a strong ally in AG Yost. In fact, he adds poignant perspective to the prosecutors’ plea:

“The bottom line: Ohio’s death penalty is a farce and a broken promise of justice — and it must be fixed.”

From our perspective, it appears as if state House and Senate members simply lack the political will to fix what Yost most accurately describes as “a broken system.”

How else to account for legislators’ failure to act and, in many cases, even seriously consider a hodgepodge of proposals introduced over the past six years to end the impasse and let capital punishment live or die in this state? Now it appears as if legislators have three options to end the stalemate once and for all in the current 2025-26 General Assembly session. They can:

�–� Expedite and enact House Bill 36, which would permit the use of nitrogen gas as a viable execution method as other states have done successfully. After all, the seemingly never-ending moratorium on executions by DeWine resulted from problems that cropped up with botched executions when Ohio attempted to use common execution drugs. Sadly, this bill has languished in committee since its introduction in early February.

�–� Expedite and enact Senate Bill 134, co-sponsored by Sen. Al Cutrona, R-Canfield, which would abolish any and all uses of capital punishment even for the 122 men and one woman from Howland currently lingering on Death Row. It, too, has withered in committee inaction since early March. Its counterpart in the lower legislative chamber is House Bill 72, co-sponsored by Valley legislators Monica Robb Blasdell, R-Columbiana, and David Thomas, R-Jefferson. But it, too, has been tucked away virtually unnoticed in committee all year.

�–� Draft a constitutional referendum issue to place before all Ohio voters in the earliest possible statewide election or special election to abolish the death penalty. If it passes, the debate would be settled. If it fails, the Legislature would be forced to obey the majority will of the electorate and ensure the law is carried out with all due speed.

Given the Legislature’s history of sluggish lollygagging on capital punishment, we suspect Option 3 may be the best passageway out of lethargy. Watkins and Lewandowski also consider a statewide vote on the death penalty as a viable alternative. In their letter, they write,”Repeatedly we haven’t opposed putting a repeal of the death penalty on the ballot for the people to decide whether capital punishment should be abolished.”

As the fiery debate rages on, one thing is clear. Ohio must not allow the death penalty’s state of limbo to endure much longer. It’s costly to Ohio taxpayers, and it’s insensitive to heartbroken survivors of victims. As such, legislators must respond to the well justified pleas of Watkins, Lewandowski and this newspaper by taking concrete action within weeks of reconvening this fall on using or losing the death penalty in our great state.