Ohio inmate- too overweight for execution

[pumpkinpie]

News
08/04/2008 20:13:08 EST Haraz Ghanbari/AP Photo

Ohio inmate says he's too fat for execution
ANDREW WELSH-HUGGINS
Associated Press Writer

A death row inmate scheduled for execution says he's too fat to be put to death, claiming executioners would have trouble finding his veins and that his weight could diminish the effectiveness of one of the lethal injection drugs.

Lawyers for Richard Cooey argue in a federal lawsuit that Cooey - 5-feet-7 and 267 pounds - had poor veins when he faced execution five years ago and the problem has been worsened by weight gain.

The lawsuit, filed Friday in federal court, also says prison officials have had difficulty drawing blood from Cooey for medical procedures.

Cooey, 41, is sentenced to die for raping and murdering two young women in 1986. His execution is scheduled for Oct. 14.

His attorneys say a drug he is taking for migraine headaches could affect the execution process. The drug Topamax, a type of seizure medication, may have created a resistance to thiopental, the drug used to put inmates to sleep before two other lethal drugs are administered, Dr. Mark Heath, a physician hired by the Ohio Public Defender's Office, said in documents filed with the court.

Heath says Cooey's weight, combined with the potential drug resistance, increases the risk he would not be properly anesthetized.

"All of the experts agree if the first drug doesn't work, the execution is going to be excruciating," Cooey's public defender, Kelly Culshaw Schneider, said Monday.

Prison system spokeswoman Andrea Carson and Jim Gravelle, a spokesman for the Ohio Attorney General's Office, both said Monday they hadn't seen the lawsuit and couldn't comment.

Last year, Carson cited the obesity of condemned inmate Christopher Newton as one of the reasons prison officials had difficulty accessing his veins before his execution. Newton was 6 feet tall and weighed 265 pounds.

Two years ago, convicted killer Jeffrey Lundgren was put to death after a federal appeals court rejected his claim that he was at greater risk of experiencing pain and suffering because he was overweight and diabetic.

[pumpkinpie]

Unfortunately, he'll probably be executed anyway. No one will care about the excruciating pain and suffering which will likely be caused by this execution. I hope I'm wrong but that's just my guess.

[pumpkinpie]

News
08/25/2008 14:37:29 EST Obese Ohio death row inmate asks state for mercy
By ANDREW WELSH-HUGGINS
Associated Press Writer

A death row inmate who says he's too fat to be executed received poor legal help during his trial and later when he appealed the death sentence, his lawyers said Monday during a clemency hearing.

It's the second time that Richard Cooey, convicted of killing two University of Akron students in 1986, has asked the state for mercy. The Ohio Parole Board denied a similar request five years ago and Cooey came within a day of being executed in 2003 before a federal judge issued a reprieve.

In a lawsuit filed earlier this month, his lawyers said executioners would have trouble finding Cooey's veins and that his weight could diminish the effectiveness of one of the lethal injection drugs.

Cooey stands 5 feet, 7 inches tall and weighs 267 pounds. His execution is scheduled for Oct. 14.

Cooey didn't attend Monday's clemency hearing, and neither side argued the merits of the obesity lawsuit.

His lawyers said that Cooey's original defense team didn't properly present evidence about the effect of beatings Cooey received as a child as well as the impact of Cooey's alcohol abuse.

Cooey, 41, isn't the same person who committed the murders and is remorseful to the point of self-loathing, defense attorney Dana Cole told the parole board.

"If he's killed on Oct. 14, we will kill a changed man," Cole said. "He's not the same man who committed these crimes."

Parole Board member Sandra Mack questioned whether Cooey has ever acknowledged his role in the crimes.

"This just does not sound like someone taking responsibility for the major part he played in killing these young women," Mack said.

Summit County Prosecutor Sherri Bevan Walsh reviewed graphic details of the rape and murder of the two students, who met Cooey and his co-defendant after the two teens threw chunks of concrete off an overpass, striking the women's car.

Walsh also reviewed Cooey's unsuccessful attempt to escape from death row in 2005, when he used a homemade ladder constructed of rolled-up magazines and sheets to scale an outdoor recreation area wall.

"In the 22 years since the defendant committed these brutal acts, he has never demonstrated one second of genuine remorse for murdering these two young women," Walsh said.

Cooey's accomplice, Clinton Dickens, was not eligible for the death penalty because he was 17 at the time of the murders. He is serving a life sentence.

The parole board will make a recommendation to Gov. Ted Strickland on Tuesday. Strickland can follow the board's ruling or make his own decision.

[smokey1]

I feel so sorry for him,my lovely mother is a bit over weight & when
she has blood test the nurses seem to have trouble inserting the needle & finding the vein,so i know where he is coming from.

[pumpkinpie]

Ohio: Obesity Fails to Stay an Execution

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: October 9, 2008

A federal appeals court and the Ohio Supreme Court have rejected arguments that a death row inmate is too obese to die by lethal injection. A three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit joined the Ohio Supreme Court in giving the go-ahead to execute Richard W. Cooey II, 41. Mr. Cooey, left, who is 5-foot-7 and weighs 267 pounds, is scheduled to die Tuesday for killing two University of Akron students in 1986. He would be the first person executed in Ohio since the end of a de facto moratorium on lethal injection that lasted more than a year. Mr. Cooey’s lawyers had argued that prison food and limited opportunities to exercise contributed to Mr. Cooey’s obesity, exacerbating problems for the execution team in finding a viable vein for lethal injection.

www.nytimes.com/2008/10/10/us/10brfs-OBESITYFAILS_BRF.html?_r=1&ref=us&oref=slogin

[pumpkinpie]

The state of Ohio has executed Richard Cooey today.
www.abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/wireStory?id=6027845

[biglinmarshall]

I know I'm in the minority here but I believe that justice was done.

I am NOT one of those moronic pros who masturbates online at the thought of an execution and cheers wildly as if they were at some kind of football match.

I feel only a sense of sadness but also a sigh of relief that a man guilty of a horrific murder paid the supreme and IMHO the ONLY appropriate penalty for what he did.

I'm afraid that pros get just as irritated with my lack of one-dimensionality as antis. Even my dear friend Eva and I sometimes disagree!

[waldron]

You are not in the minority with me. I tend to agree with this execution. His crimes were horrific and the excuse of weight to get out of the execution with pathetic to me, as one sees the execution was not a blotched one.