Ohio dismemberment killer arrives in death house, could become 1st executed with single drug

Ohio dismemberment killer arrives in death house

COLUMBUS, Ohio — A condemned killer scheduled to become the first person in the U.S. put to death with a single drug — in an execution that could take longer than previous procedures — arrived Monday at the Ohio death house.

Kenneth Biros, 51, was sentenced to die for killing and dismembering a woman he met in a bar in 1991.

It would be the first injection under Ohio’s switch from using three drugs to a new one-drug execution method.

A backup method allows executioners to inject drugs directly into muscles.

Ohio overhauled its execution procedure following the botched execution of Romell Broom that was halted by Gov. Ted Strickland in September. Executioners tried unsuccessfully for two hours to find a usable vein for injection, painfully hitting bone and muscle in as many as 18 needle sticks. Broom, 53, has appealed the state’s attempt to try again.

The state had two goals in changing its process. Switching to one drug was meant to end a five-year-old lawsuit that claims Ohio’s three-drug system could cause severe pain. Injection experts and defense attorneys agree the single dose of thiopental sodium will not cause pain.

The backup procedure involving muscle injection was created in case a situation similar to Broom’s execution happens again.

States are watching Ohio’s change but none have made a similar switch. Florida, Kentucky, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia are among those saying they will keep the three-drug method.

Biros reached the holding area for death row inmates at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville shortly before 10 a.m. Monday. The small cell is about 15 feet away from the chamber where inmates are put to death.

It’s the second trip to Lucasville for Biros, who spent more than 30 hours in the holding cell in March 2007 before the U.S. Supreme Court stopped his execution. Biros was resting and appeared relaxed, said prisons spokeswoman Julie Walburn.

Injection experts agree the execution will take longer with the single dose of thiopental sodium than the previous three-drug system. Ohio inmates have generally taken about seven minutes to die. Mark Dershwitz, an anesthesiologist who consulted with Ohio, estimates it could take 15 minutes.

Witnesses will be allowed to stay and watch for as long as it takes, Walburn said Monday.

Trumbull County Sheriff Tom Altiere, allowed a spot under Ohio law, will be the first sheriff to witness an execution since Ohio resumed putting people to death in 1999, Walburn said.

A federal judge earlier Monday refused to delay the execution and Biros immediately appealed to the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati.

The 6th Circuit on Friday rejected a related request to delay Biros’ execution, a decision he appealed Monday to the U.S. Supreme Court.

In Monday’s ruling, U.S. District Judge Gregory Frost in Columbus said Ohio’s execution system still has flaws that “raise profound concerns and present unnecessary risks.”

Frost also said he’s concerned about the competency of Ohio’s executioners and how much those executioners appear able to deviate from the state’s written execution rules.

But the judge also wrote, it appears unlikely that Biros can “demonstrate that those risks rise to the level of violating the United States Constitution.”

In asking Frost for a stay, Biros had argued that the new execution method still left vein access issues unresolved, subjecting him to the risk of severe pain, and had described the new one-drug approach as “impermissible human experimentation.” The judge in his ruling called the arguments “unpersuasive.”

All 36 death penalty states use lethal injection, and 35 rely on the three-drug method. Nebraska, which recently adopted injection over electrocution, has proposed the three-drug method but hasn’t finalized the process.

Biros killed 22-year-old Tami Engstrom near Warren in 1991 after offering to drive her home from a bar, then scattered her body parts in Ohio and Pennsylvania.