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Gov. DeWine says lethal injection is no longer viable option for executions in Ohio

The governor made the comments during a recent sit-down interview with the Associated Press.

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Editor's note: the video in the player above is from a story published on December 7, 2020. 

Governor Mike DeWine does not believe that lethal injections are viable options for executions according to a new interview with the Associated Press

The Ohio governor sat down with AP recently to talk about the year that has been, including the COVID-19 pandemic, recent attempts by the Ohio legislature to limit his power, and a slew of other topics. 

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DeWine told AP that it's “pretty clear” that the state will not have executions in 2021, but also that a switch of execution methods isn't of the legislature's highest priority, at the moment. 

“Lethal injection appears to us to be impossible from a practical point of view today,” the governor told AP, also adding that Ohio seemingly has an “unofficial moratorium” on capital punishment. 

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Governor DeWine also told AP that he is now “much more skeptical about whether it meets the criteria that was certainly in my mind when I voted for the death penalty and that was that it in fact did deter crime, which to me is the moral justification.”

The last state-ordered execution took place in July of 2018, in which Robert Van Hook for killing a man in Cincinnatti in 1985. 

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