Re-Examining Lucasville: Essay 6

This is the sixth essay in Staughton Lynd's new Lucasville Re-Examined Essays series, leading up to the 20th Aniversary Conference of the Lucasville Uprising in April of 2013.

By Staughton Lynd, November 2012

Let’s try to visualize the most unfair criminal trial we can imagine.  Let’s make a list of elements that might be part of such an unjust proceeding.

The list might include the following elements:

1. The judge excuses one potential jury member after another who states that he or she could not in good conscience recommend the death penalty.

2. The evidence in support of convicting the defendant consists entirely of testimony by other prisoners.

Each of these elements was present in the trial of George Skatzes, who was found guilty and sentenced to death for the aggravated murder of prisoners Earl Elder and David Sommers. 

In addition, in the portion of the trial concerning Mr. Elder’s death:

3. Skatzes was sentenced to death for allegedly ordering prisoner Rodger Snodgrass to murder Earl Elder. But Snodgrass, a prosecution witness, testified that Elder was still alive when he left Elder’s cell.

4. The medical examiner testified that Elder’s fatal wounds were caused by a broad blade. However, Snodgrass himself as well as another prosecution witness, Tim Williams, testified that the weapon supposedly carried by Snodgrass was a thin, icepick-like shank that made small, round holes.

5. Tim Williams was himself named by two other prisoners as one of the three men who actually killed Elder.  Williams is now on the street.

6. Another prisoner, Eric Girdy, has confessed to being one of those three men. Girdy has repeatedly stated under oath that Skatzes was nowhere around at the time and had nothing to do with what happened.

7. Girdy testified that the weapon he used was a piece of broken glass from an officers’ restroom. The medical examiner testified that he found a shard of glass in one of the potentially lethal wounds made by a broad blade.

8. Girdy’s belated confession was accepted as true by the special prosecutor and Girdy was duly sentenced in the Scioto County Court of Common Pleas.
In the portion of the trial concerning the murder of David Sommers:

9. Several weeks after Skatzes was convicted and sentenced to death for Sommers’ homicide, prisoner Aaron Jefferson, in a separate trial, was found guilty of allegedly committing the same murder.

10. As in the trial of Skatzes, when Jefferson was tried for killing Sommers the medical examiner testified once again that Sommers had died as the result of a single, fatal blow by an instrument like a baseball bat.  Thus two men were found guilty of striking the same lethal blow.

11. An Ohio Court of Appeals determined that there was no way to prove which man had struck the fatal blow, but Skatzes was guilty anyway because of his “complicity” in the murder and his sentence of death should be affirmed.

Nothing has been done to vacate George Skatzes’ death sentence for the aggravated murders of Elder and Sommers.

What Skatzes Says

George Skatzes has written a statement from which the following are excerpts:

Twenty eight years and counting!  I am totally at my wits’ end!  Please let me explain!  Please hear me out!

The testimony by the inmates in the Earl Elder murder was contradicted and undermined by the testimony of the forensic pathologist.  Yet all this means nothing to the courts!  George Skatzes was found guilty and that is that! Justice?

Ohio Jury Instructions 409.56, Other Causes, Intervening Causes, states:

“If the defendant inflicted an injury not likely to produce death, and if the sole and only cause of death was a fatal injury inflicted by another person, the defendant who inflicted the original injury is not responsible for the death.”

[George adds: There is nothing true about Snodgrass’ testimony.  But if, for the sake of argument, we assumed that Snodgrass was telling the truth, since Snodgrass said Elder was alive when Snodgrass left his cell, under Jury Instruction 409.56 Skatzes could only have been guilty of attempted murder.]

In the case of David Sommers, there is no physical evidence to link George Skatzes to the crime.  The inmates who testified against George Skatzes are self-admitted participants in the murder!

We have two people convicted for causing the death of David Sommers by dealing a single massive blow to the head. Two people convicted for the very same act? The object is, of course, to convict at any cost!

Summing up his trial and convictions, Skatzes declares:

"We have a man convicted and sentenced to death only on the word of jailhouse snitches.  It was their word alone without any independent objective and corroborating evidence."

Law Versus Justice

In three aspects of the courts’ proceedings concerning Mr. Skatzes and others of the Lucasville Five, prosecutors have been able to cite and rely on the law as pronounced by state and federal courts.  But that doesn’t mean that these convictions and sentencse are just! It only means that Skatzes, like other Lucasville defendants, is a victim of what he calls “the criminal injustice system.”

Let’s consider three of the judicial doctrines that stand between Lucasville defendants and light at the end of the tunnel.

The Death Qualified Jury
         
A jury’s recommendation of the death penalty must be unanimous. It takes only one juror in twelve to prevent a recommendation for death.

But under current law in state and federal courts, any potential juror who states that he or she opposes the death penalty under all circumstances will almost surely be “excused,” that is, excluded, from jury service in a capital case.

In contrast, a juror who indicates support for the death penalty is asked another question, namely, "Would you follow the instructions of the judge about the law?"  If the juror answers, Yes, then that juror may be seated even though he or she favors the death penalty just as strongly as opponents of the death penalty oppose it.

The following extracts show the doctrine of the “death qualified jury” at work during the “voir dire” (jury selection process) in the case of George Skatzes.

Juror #1

THE COURT: . . . I have a question I want to ask you. . . . [I]n a proper case where the facts warrant it and the law permits it, could you join in with others in signing a verdict form which might recommend to the Court the imposition of the death penalty?

A:  No, sir.

THE COURT:  You don’t believe you could do so?

A:  I don’t believe so.

THE COURT:  Under any circumstances?

A:  No.

THE COURT:  Could you tell me why?

A:  I had a brother who was murdered and I found it in my heart to forgive that man. I would not have found him guilty to the extent that his life would be taken.

THE COURT:  In other words, you feel that if you didn’t do it in your brother’s case, you wouldn’t do it in any other case, right?

A:  Right. . . .

[DEFENSE ATTORNEY]: . . . Do you feel that this is a teaching of your church?

A:  Not so much a teaching of my church as it is an understanding of mine that I do not create life.  I am not giver of life, so I feel that it’s not my responsibility or within reason to expect me to take a life. . . .

THE COURT:  You may step down.


Juror #8

THE COURT:  . . . In a proper case, where the facts warrant it and the law permits it, could you join in with the other jurors in signing a verdict form which would recommend to the Court the death penalty?

A:  Yes, your Honor.

 [PROSECUTING ATTORNEY]:  . . . We brought you here because we want to discuss with you your views on capital punishment. Can you share them with us, please?

A:  I strongly believe in them. I wish they were enforced more often.

[PROSECUTING ATTORNEY]:  . . . Do you believe the death penalty is the only appropriate penalty in all cases of an intentional killing?

A:  Pretty much.

[PROSECUTING ATTORNEY]:  Does that mean?

A:  Yes.

[PROSECUTING ATTORNEY]:  . . . You can think of the wors[t] crime that comes to your mind and if you find that person guilty at the first phase, we don’t go straight to death.  We have the second hearing at which point you would get additional evidence to consider in making your decision as to what punishment is appropriate. . . .
What we need to know is whether you could set aside your thoughts as to what you think the law should be and follow the law that the Judge gives you?

A:  Yes.

[PROSECUTING ATTORNEY]: If you found someone guilty of a horrible, horrible crime, as bad as you can think of, would you be willing to keep an open mind and listen to the evidence at the second phase before making a decision as to which penalty is appropriate?         

A:  Yes.

[PROSECUTING ATTORNEY]: No matter how bad the crime?

A:  Yes.

....           

THE COURT:  . . . We want you back [to serve as a juror in the case].

With the doctrine of the death-qualified jury before us, there should be no difficulty in understanding why, in such a high percentage of  cases, Lucasville
prosecutors either won a favorable jury decision or entered into a favorable plea agreement.  At one public forum concerning George Skatzes, known to fellow prisoners as “Big George,” an attender who had read the dialogue between the judge and potential jurors  commented:  “Big George is in Big Trouble.”

Studies cited by the American Bar Association and the American Law Institute indicate that the process of selecting a death-qualified jury produces juries that are more likely to convict the defendant during the guilt phase of the trial, and more likely to impose the death penalty during the sentencing phase.  John Paul Stevens, retired Justice of the United States Supreme Court, stated when he was on the bench that this rule “deprive[s] the defendant of a trial by jurors representing a fair cross-section of the community.”  He is convinced that “the process of obtaining a ‘death qualified jury’ is really a procedure that has the purpose and effect of obtaining a jury that is biased in favor of conviction.”

The Doctrine of Complicity

A familiar hypothetical presents the problem of a group of bank robbers.

Robber A is the driver of the getaway car.  While his companions enter the bank, he stays at the wheel of their vehicle, perhaps listening to the car radio or reading the newspaper.  Meantime, the men actually in the bank encounter difficulties, there is a  scuffle, robber B uses his gun, and a bank teller falls to the floor, dead.

What should be the punishment of robber A?  Under Ohio law he can be found to be “complicit” in the entire criminal course of conduct, and presumed to be just as guilty as the man who pulled the trigger.  Moreover, whereas under Ohio law someone guilty of “conspiracy” to rob the bank would not be eligible for the death penalty, under the Ohio law of “complicity” every one in the group would be exposed to the possibility of execution.

After Aaron Jefferson was convicted of striking the same fatal blow for which George Skatzes had been convicted, an Ohio Court of Appeals considered the case.  

The court began its explanation by stating:  “Skatzes contends that his due process rights were violated because the state charged and convicted two inmates—Skatzes and Aaron Jefferson—with the murder of David Sommers, when the evidence suggested only one fatal blow. He argues that these [were] ‘inherently factually contradictory theories’.”

Not so, the court continued.  “The state’s theory was that both Skatzes and Jefferson were complicit in the crime; there was no way to prove who had inflicted the fatal head injury. . . .  A defendant charged with an offense may be convicted of that offense upon proof that he was complicit in its commission.”

The court may not have read the transcript of the Skatzes and Jefferson trials. In closing argument in the Skatzes trial, Prosecutor Daniel Hogan did not say, “there was no way to prove who had inflicted the fatal head injury.”  Rather, Hogan asked the jury to think “about David Sommers, . . . the one where [Skatzes] wielded a bat and literally beat the brains out of this man’s head.”  State v. Skatzes, p. 6108.  And in the Jefferson trial, Prosecutor Crowe told the jury:

If there was only one blow to the head of David Sommers, the strongest evidence you have [is that] this is the individual—I won’t call him a human—this is the individual that administered that blow. . . .  If there was only one blow, he’s the one that gave it.  He’s the one that hit him like a steer going through the stockyard, the executioner with the pick axe, trying to put the pick through the brain.

State v. Jefferson, Tr. at 656-57.

The court also failed to mention that whereas Jefferson was sentenced to many years behind bars, Skatzes was sentenced to death.
         
Jason Robb was the victim of a prosecution theory about Sommers’ murder that was equally bizarre.  According to prosecution witnesses, Sommers chased Robb from L-2 to L-7, where Sommers was beaten to death by prisoners other than Robb.  Yet Robb was convicted and sentenced to death for Sommers’ murder! 

Ineffective Prohibition of Snitch Testimony

Heightened reliability is required in capital cases.  Convictions based on the testimony of  informants, who are offered reduced charges, parole, or other benefits in exchange for their testimony, are inherently unreliable in the absence of independent and objective corroborating evidence connecting the defendant to the crime.

In recognition of the unreliability of informant testimony, the House of Delegates of the American Bar Association resolved on February 14, 2005, that the ABA

“urges federal, state, local, and territorial governments to reduce the risk of convicting the innocent, while increasing the likelihood of convicting the guilty, by ensuring that no prosecution should occur based solely upon uncorroborated jailhouse informant testimony.” 

Likewise, the California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice declared in 2006:

"A conviction can not be had upon the testimony of an in-custody informant unless it shall be corroborated by such other evidence as shall independently tend to connect the defendant with the commission of the offense . . . .  Corroboration of an in-custody informant cannot be provided by the testimony of another in-custody informant."

The Lucasville prosecutions ignored the necessity for objective corroboration of informant testimony.  The uncorroborated testimony of prisoner informants, so-called “snitch” testimony, was the principal basis for every Lucasville capital conviction.

One way in which Ohio seeks to guard against the perjury of snitches is by requiring the judge to give the following instruction to the jury.
The testimony of an accomplice does not become inadmissible because of his complicity, moral turpitude, or self-interest, but the admitted or claimed complicity of a witness may affect his credibility and make his testimony subject to grave suspicion, and require that it be weighed with great caution.

However, common sense suggests that reading to a jury a long sentence that begins with a double negative and is made up of polysyllabic and unfamiliar words is unlikely to protect a defendant.  Prosecutors have many ways to make perjured testimony appear convincing to a jury. For example, an informer may describe the scene of a crime with seeming truthfulness since,  after all, often the witness was actually there and simply ascribes to others the actions he himself committed.

The Lucasville prosecutors used a variety of techniques to procure compliant prisoner informants and prepare them for trial.  In Skatzes’ trial, prosecutor (now Ohio judge) Daniel Hogan admitted that Daniel Stead, who prosecuted  the trial with him, had told a wavering prisoner, “you are either going to be my witness, or I’m going to come back and try to kill you.”  In preparing prisoner Robert Brookover as a witness,  prosecutors hit him with a rolled-up newspaper until he stopped beginning each sentence of his testimony with the words, “I’m not going  to lie to you.”  And by bringing potential prosecution witnesses together at the so-called “snitch academy” in Lima, Ohio,prosecutors sought to ensure that their witnesses at trial would tell consistent stories.

Ohio court opinions also emphasize, as a second shield against unreliable snitch testimony, the right of the defense to cross-examine prosecution witnesses.  But this right was systematically obstructed by Lucasville prosecutors. 
Typically, officers of the Ohio State Highway Patrol interviewed potential prosecution witnesses as many as half a dozen times before trial. Summaries of these interviews were then entered into a computer database.  But only when the witness began to provide the narrative that the prosecution desired were his remarks likely to be preserved in the form of a tape-recorded interview or deposition.  This prosecution-friendly final product could then be provided  to the defense in “discovery.”  The database entries might have revealed how much the testimony of the witness had changed over time as it was shaped by interviewers from the state. These entries were often not produced.  But in Keith LaMar’s case, prosecutors successfully impeached the testimony of defense witness Gino Washington by using interview records that had not been produced in discovery.

Defense Alternatives
         
Lucasville capital defendants were faced with an excruciating choice.

If they had not killed anyone during the eleven days, they had the right to go to trial and try to convince a jury of their innocence.  But their juries would be made up of men and women willing to recommend the death penalty; their trials would be governed by the doctrine of complicity;  and their trial court judges would have no way to assure defendants of the good faith and credibility of prosecution witnesses.

However if, recognizing that the dice were loaded, the defendant elected to pleabargain, the best possible outcome was likely to be imprisonment for life.

George Skatzes and the Lucasville Rebellion

An article by Staughton Lynd

On: http://georgeskatzes.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=geo&action=display&thread=67 (uploaded 2007)
(date of writing unknown)

From April 11 to 21, 1993, what appears to have been the longest prison rebellion in United States history took place at the maximum security prison in Lucasville, in southern Ohio.(note 1) More than four hundred prisoners were involved. Nine prisoners and a guard were killed. After a negotiated surrender, five prisoners in the rebellion were sentenced to death.

The five prisoners from the rebellion on death row—the "Lucasville Five"—are a microcosm of the rebellion's united front. Three are black, two are white. Two of the blacks are Sunni Muslims. Both of the whites were, at the time of the rebellion, members of the Aryan Brotherhood.

My wife and I know the Lucasville Five and are assisting with the appeal of one of the white men, who has since repented his affiliation with the Aryan Brotherhood. What we have learned should give pause to anyone inclined to dismiss all members of a group like the Aryan Brotherhood as incurably racist. Let me give you a synopsis of the childhood of George Skatzes (pronounced "skates"), his experiences during the 1993 rebellion, and the way that his actions ran out ahead of his organizational affiliation and political vocabulary.

In Marion, Ohio, where George grew up, whites lived on one side of the tracks and blacks on the other. George and his sister, Jackie, were the children of their mother's third marriage. Their parents were divorced when George was an infant and he grew up in his mother's home, where a succession of her boyfriends passed through. The house was in perpetual disorder; George and Jackie were embarrassed by the clothes they wore to school and never invited school friends to their house. George was often beaten by his mother or one of his two older stepbrothers. When he became a young adult, he often tried to help his mother, once working overtime for five weeks and saving all his pay to buy her a freezer and refrigerator. But the gift was unappreciated.

George became aware that the neighbors considered his family to be "white trash." He felt more welcome on the black side of town than by the people next door. One of his best friends was the child of an interracial couple. "I might as well have been biracial myself," he recalls.

How could a person with these views have joined the Aryan Brotherhood at Lucasville? According to George, it was not because of an attitude of racial superiority. "You won't find anyone at Lucasville I judged because of the color of his skin," he insists, and the testimony of many black prisoners, both at trial and in private conversation with my wife and myself, supports this. "One race should not have to die for another to live," George Skatzes says. "We are all people."

Difficult as it may be for someone outside the walls to understand, George Skatzes states that he joined the Aryan Brotherhood because he perceived whites at Lucasville as a minority who needed to band together for self-protection. A majority of prisoners were black. The deputy warden, the warden, and the head of the statewide Department of Rehabilitation and Correction were black as well. On the one hand, all prisoners at Lucasville were oppressed. Conditions in the cell block used for administrative segregation were such that a petition was sent to Amnesty International and several prisoners cut off their pinky fingers and mailed them to the federal government. On the other hand, in Skatzes' experience, white prisoners like himself were punished for conduct that was condoned when committed by blacks.

Still insistent that these were the facts, Skatzes now says that joining the Aryan Brotherhood was "the biggest mistake of my life." In the course of responding to the day-by-day events of the rebellion, he found himself speaking not for white prisoners or for those white prisoners who belonged to the Aryan Brotherhood, but for the entire inmate body.

The disturbance at Lucasville was triggered by an attempt to force prisoners to submit to tuberculosis testing, by means of a substance containing alcohol injected under the skin. A number of Muslims said that receiving the injection was contrary to their religious beliefs, and suggested alternative means of testing. The warden responded that he was running the prison. He made plans to lock down the prison on the day after Easter and, if necessary, to force all prisoners to be injected. These plans became common knowledge. Accordingly, on the afternoon of Easter Sunday, prisoners returning from recreation on the yard overpowered a number of guards and took them hostage, occupying the L block of the prison.

During the next several hours, black prisoners killed five white prisoners believed to be snitches. A race war, like the one during the Santa Fe prison riot a few years earlier, seemed imminent.

At this point, two Muslims approached George Skatzes. George had not taken part in planning the rebellion. He celled in L block and had stayed there when the riot began, in order to protect his property and to look after his friends. The black men who spoke to Skatzes were aware that, as a physically imposing older convict (in his late forties), "Big George" had often been asked to mediate disputes among prisoners. Siddique Abdullah Hasan and Cecil Allen told Skatzes that whites and blacks had gathered on different sides of the gymnasium and the atmosphere was very tense. They asked "Big George" to help them ensure that the protest would be directed against the prison administration, their common oppressor.

Skatzes agreed. He went to the gym and spoke to both the blacks and whites. He put his arm around the shoulders of a black man and said, "If they come in here, they're going to kill us no matter what color we are." He appealed to members of each group to mix with members of the other group.

The next day, April 12, George Skatzes (with a megaphone) and Cecil Allen (carrying a huge white flag of truce) went out on the yard to try to start negotiations. On Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, April 13 through 15, Skatzes was the principal telephone negotiator for the prisoners. He took part in meetings of a leadership council representing the three main organized groups in L block: the Muslims, members of the Aryan Brotherhood (ABs), and the Black Gangster Disciples. On the afternoon and evening of Thursday, April 15, he negotiated the release of a hostage guard who was experiencing extreme emotional trauma, accompanied Officer Clark into the yard, and released him to the authorities. He made a radio address in which he said: "We are a unit here. They try to make this a racial issue [but] it is not a racial issue. Black and white alike have joined hands at [Lucasville] and have become one strong unit."

You see the point. The things that Skatzes did, in calming racial antagonisms, in working cooperatively with blacks, in characterizing the rebellion publicly as the work of "one strong unit," both black and white, hardly expressed the worldview of the Aryan Brotherhood. In part, Skatzes' actions expressed his personal decency; they also responded to a practical situation that called for racial cooperation. Experience ran ahead of ideology. Actions spoke louder than organizational labels.

George Skatzes and the black prisoners among the Lucasville Five stand in solidarity publicly and struggle privately to understand each other. During a fast that they undertook together, their list of demands, drafted by one of the blacks in the group, began with a concern for proper medical treatment for Skatzes. At the super-maximum-security prison in Youngstown where the Five are now housed, a number of prisoners began another fast. After about a week, only Skatzes and Siddique Abdullah Hasan were still going without food. The prison approached each one with assurances that their complaints would be addressed. Each refused to break his fast until told directly by the other that he was ready to eat again. Hasan wrote to me: "I chose to stay on the fast to let them know that I was down with George's struggle, too, and I would not sit quiet and allow the system to mess over him . . . [T]hey got the message and know that we are one."

From Prison Resistance to Class Struggle
How, if at all, can this experience of prisoners overcoming racism be extrapolated? What is the relationship of prison resistance to the wider movement for social change?

A good deal of the recent writing about racism calls on white workers to give up "white-skin privilege" voluntarily in order to become legitimate participants in the class struggle. Such a voluntaristic approach to racism is unsatisfactory for exactly the same reason that Marx and Engels found Utopian Socialism to be inadequate. Workers do not become socialists because agitators have gone house to house preaching the virtues of common ownership. Workers become socialists in action, through experience. Thus, Eugene Debs first recognized the need for the broadest possible unity of the working class in economic struggle and founded the American Railway Union to take the place of the separate unions of the railway crafts. Then, after the Pullman strike, Debs came to understand that in a capitalist society, government will always intervene in the economic class struggle on behalf of the capitalist class, and helped to organize the Socialist Party.

Racism, too, will be transformed through experience and struggle. We should anticipate that the objective contradictions of capitalism will again and again call on workers somehow to set aside their antagonisms toward one another, so that they can effectively act together against the common oppressor. As workers'actions change in response to the need for a solidarity in which the survival of each depends on the survival of all, attitudes will change also.

There are at least two obvious differences between resistance in prisons and forms of struggle outside the walls. First, a prison is a total environment. Black and white workers in the larger society typically leave behind the integrated workplace setting when they punch out, returning to segregated living situations in the community. Inside a prison, blacks and whites must survive in one another's company twenty-four hours a day.

Second, anything good inside a prison must ordinarily be brought about by the prisoners themselves, from below, through self-organization. In this respect, prisons differ from the military. Like prisons, the military is a total institution, but in the military, desirable social change can come from above, and did come from above, when the Armed Forces were integrated after the Second World War.

I know another George—George Sullivan, a truck driver from Gary, Indiana—whose experience illustrates the effectiveness of the equal status contract imposed from above in the Armed Forces. George Sullivan grew up in southern Illinois, the same racist setting recalled by David Roediger in the opening pages of The Wages of Whiteness.2

George Sullivan describes the racism he absorbed as a child:

There never was any question in my mind that black persons weren't any good. I knew that, but it didn't necessarily mean they were bad people because everyone knew that a black person's a coward and he won't cause you any trouble. There weren't any around where I lived.

One did come to the house one time, scared me to death. I saw him at the door, there he was, and I didn't know what to do. Any time we would be doing something wrong, one of the comments my mother would make was, "I'll have some big black person come and get you if you don't stop that." So I went to the door and there was this big black person. I just knew that he had come after me. But that's the only association I had. I wasn't taught to hate them. It was like the feeling about animals. Their place is not in the house or it's not where you are. Animals live in the woods. black persons live somewhere else.3

George Sullivan's relationship with blacks changed when he went into the military. The new policy of integration had just gone into effect. George reported to a barracks where he found that he was the only white. After informing the sergeant that there had been a mistake, he was told, "No, we've been having some problems about not integrating enough. As new white guys come on the base they're going to be put in there. You just happen to be the first." Then this happened:

I was a meat-cutter and I got a bit careless. I cut three or four of my fingers. I had them all bandaged up. I had just been promoted to sergeant but I still had my corporal stripes. I was sitting out in front of the barracks and the sergeant came by and he said, "Sullivan, get your stripes on." "I can't sew with one hand," I said, "and I don't have any money to take them over to the PX." He said, "You'll have stripes on your uniform by tomorrow or we'll take the stripes away from you."

I was sitting there by myself just wondering what to do. One of the guys in the barracks who'd heard it, he came out and said, "Have you already got your stripes?" I said, "Yeah, I bought them already." He said, "Well, if you'll go get them I'll sew them on for you." So that was the first thing that really broke the ice. He sat and sewed those stripes on my uniform while we got to know each other.4

Neither George Skatzes nor George Sullivan were, or are, ideological radicals. But they are white workers who have substantially overcome the racism that surrounded them. Both learned through their experience to deal with people as individuals rather than to judge them by the color of their skin.

We need a synthesis of the pressure for social change illustrated by the military policy of integration, with working-class self-emancipation. Prison resistance begins to suggest such a synthesis. There, the common need to survive creates the pressure to cooperate. But prison administrators will not organize that cooperation from above. In fact, prison administrators do all that they can to forbid and break up self-organization by prisoners. Therefore, black and white prisoners must depend on themselves to build solidarity with each other.

In the 1960s and early 1970s, the self-organized protest movement of blacks created a model for students, women, workers, and eventually, soldiers. In the same way, the self-organized resistance of black and white prisoners can become a model for the rest of us in overcoming racism. Life will continue to ask of working people that they find their way to solidarity. Surely, there are sufficient instances of deep attitudinal change on the part of white workers to persuade us that a multi-ethnic class consciousness is not only necessary, but also possible.

NOTES


The single most remarkable thing about the Lucasville rebellion is that white and black prisoners formed a common front against the authorities. When the State Highway Patrol came into the occupied cell block after the surrender, they found slogans written on the walls of the corridor and in the gymnasium that read: "Convict unity," "Convict race," "Black and whites together," "Blacks and whites, whites and blacks, unity," "Whites and blacks together," "Black and white unity."

1. I have written about the Lucasville rebellion in "Black and White and Dead All Over: The Lucasville Insurrection," Race Traitor, no. 8 (Winter 1998); "Lessons from Lucasville," The Catholic Worker, vol. LXV, no. 7 (December 1998) (republ. 2010); "The Lucasville Trials," Prison Legal News, vol. 10, no. 6 (June 1999). I have also written a docudrama entitled "Big George," a play about the rebellion in two acts and twelve scenes, in which the dialogue is drawn entirely from words actually spoken. Those who would like a copy can send a check for $7.50, made out to me, to 1694 Timbers Court, Niles, OH 44446.

2. David R. Roediger, The Wages of Whiteness: Race and the Making of the American Working Class (London: Verso, 1991), pp. 3-5.

3. George Sullivan, "Working for Survival," in Rank and File: Personal Histories by Working-Class Organizers (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1998), p. 202.

4. Ibid, pp. 202-203.

Explanation of the Innocence of George Skatzes Regarding the Lucasville Prison Riot in 1993 (2007)

Taken over from: http://georgeskatzes.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=geoisinn&action=display&thread=73 (added 2007)
Date: unknown

NOTE: The following is intended both as a contribution to Defendant Skatzes' forthcoming pleading in response to the State's "Motion to Dismiss Defendant's Petition to Vacate," and as a free-standing explanation of Skatzes' innocence of the two charges for which he was sentenced to death: the aggravated murder of Earl Elder, and the aggravated murder of David Sommers [during the Lucasville Uprising in 1993].

The Elder Killing

Prisoner Earl Elder was killed by other prisoners on the first day of the uprising, April 11, in pod L-6 of the occupied cell block.

The State concedes that there were three separate assaults on Earl Elder.

First, "Elder was beaten severely by inmates when he was removed from the L-2 safe well, where he had locked himself with Corrections Officer Ratcliff." Motion to Dismiss at 15.

Second, after Elder had been taken to cell L-6-60, prisoner Rodger Snodgrass "repeatedly stabbed him."

Third, other prisoners --the State names only prisoner Johnny Roper -- "inflicted further damage.”

However, the State's summary omits crucial details which demonstrate that the wounds inflicted by Snodgrass were not fatal and that the fatal wounds were inflicted in the third assault, with which Skatzes had no connection whatever.

Rodger Snodgrass testified that he went into L-6-60 and stabbed Elder repeatedly with a very thin, long, icepick type shank. Tr. at 4395-96, 4590. He repeated this description of his weapon in State v. Robb, Tr. at 3757, and State v. Sanders, Tr. at 2623. In State v. Skatzes, prosecution witness Tim Williams corroborated Snodgrass on this point, testifying that Snodgrass was able to slide his four fingers through and make a fist out of his hand with the point of the weapon protruding. Tr. at 3072.

The coroner, Dr. Larry Tate, testified that the icepick type instrument made only superficial, non-lethal wounds. He described the difference in appearance between the puncture wounds made by an icepick, and the wounds made by a broad-edged weapon like a knife. Tr. at 4840-44. The lethal injuries to Elder were made by a weapon with a "large edge" like a knife.  Tr. at 4837, 4843, 4845.

Snodgrass also testified that, after his assault on Elder, Elder was "still alive." Tr. at 4395. Williams testified that after Snodgrass left L block, Roper went back into L-6-60 and stabbed Elder about four times with a different weapon, which Williams agreed was a "homemade knife." Tr. at 3072, 3076-77.

It is unclear whether the fatal wounds to Elder were inflicted by Roper, as prosecution witnesses testified at trial, or by other prisoners, using a piece of broken glass, Post- Conviction Petition, Exhibit 19. The State's chief investigator agrees that Dr.Tate, the coroner, found a "small fragment of silver metal along with a chard of glass" in Elder's body.

Motion to Dismiss, Affidavit of Howard W. Hudson, para. 11.

What is crystal clear is that even if Defendant were to [accept] as true all the testimony of Rodger Snodgrass, Tim Williams. and Dr. Tate, Defendant had no connection with the third assault that actually killed Earl Elder. At most he should have been charged with attempted murder or felonious assault.

The Sommers Killinq

Prisoner David Sommers was killed by other prisoners on the last day of the Lucasville uprising, April 21,1993, in pod L-7 within the occupied cell block.

After the initial post-conviction pleadings were filed by Defendant Skatzes and by the State, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, on April 28, 2004, reversed the conviction of John David Stumpf in State v. Stumpf, 56 Ohio St.3d 712, 565 N.E.2d 835, 1990, 1990 Ohio LEXIS 1839 (1990). This Court of Appeals decision is at 2004 U.S. App. LEXIS 8332*, 2004 FED App. 0124P (6th Cir.)

The State argues in its Motion to Dismiss Skatzes' petition at 4 that "post conviction actions are limited to constitutional issues only." Stumpf requires reversal of the conviction of George Skatzes for the murder of David Sommers as a violation of his constitutional right to due process.

Stumpf was convicted as the "actual shooter" of Mary Jane Stout. "At a later trial of Stumpf's accomplice Wesley, however, the state presented the testimony of a jailhouse informant to establish that Wesley was the shooter." 2004 U.S. App. LEXIS 8332 at *3. Stumpf was sentenced to death and Wesley to Life imprisonment for the same act: firing the fatal bullets that killed Ms. Stout.

Citing decisions of the 8th, 9th and 11th Federal Appeals Courts, the sixth circuit panel concluded in Stumpf:

"We now join our sister circuits in concluding that the use of inconsistent, irreconcilable theories to convict two defendants for the same crime is a due process violation." Tr. at *49.

The convictions of both Stumpf and Wesley must be set aside, the Court held. Accordingly, the panel reversed the decision below in State v. Stumpf, and remanded the case "with instructions to issue the Writ of Habeas Corpus in the petitioner's favor, unless the state elects to retry him within 90 days of the date of entry of the conditional writ." Tr. at *70-71.

Understandably, since Stumpf had not yet been decided, the parties in this case have not previously brought before the Court the fact that, in separate trials, Georqe Skatzes and Aaron Jefferson were convicted of striking the same fatal blow that killed David Sommers. Just as in the cases of the two men convicted of firing the same bullets that killed Mary Jane Stout, the convictions of both Skatzes and Jefferson violated their constitutional right to due process and must be reversed.

In State v. Skatzes and again in State v. Jefferson, Coroner Leo Burger testified that the cause of death was one massive blow to the head. He said that the injury could well have been inflicted by a baseball bat. He described "a single injury with a blunt instrument, extremely forceful, not only fracturing the bone, shattering [it] in pieces, but also, separating the natural bone, suture lines." State v. Skatzes, Tr. at 3292-94.

Dr.Burger was explicit that this single blow was the cause of death:

Q. Doctor, do you have an opinion to a reasonable degree of medical certainty as to the cause of death of David Sommers?

A. Yes, cause of death is massive single injury to the head.

Tr. at 3295.

The obvious next question is, Who struck the single, fatal blow?

Addressing the jury both at the beginning and at the end of the trial of Defendant Skatzes, prosecutor Hogan said that it was Skatzes In opening argument in State v. Skatzes, Prosecutor Hogan stated:

“On the third killing of David Summers ["Sommers"] at the very end of the riot, you will hear evidence that Mr. Skatzes wielded the ball bat, smashed Mr. Summers' skull into a number of pieces. He didn't act alone. There were a number of people involved in the beating and stabbing and strangling, but he was the principal offender in that particular killing.”

Tr. at 1542 (emphasis added). In closing argument, prosecutor Hogan repeated:

“[T]hink about David Sommers, the third, the last of the three killings, the one where he [Skatzes] wielded a bat and literallv beat the brains out of this man's head.”

Tr. at 6108 (emphasis added).

However, in State v. Jefferson another prosecutor told another jury that the principal offender was not Skatzes, but Jefferson. Prosecutor Crowe said in closing argument that in 1994 Jefferson had told the Highway Patrol:

"I know that first lick I hit on him [Sommers] did damage. It leaked. I saw the brains leak. I got the blood all over me." Tr. at 656.

This is a reasonably accurate summary of what Jefferson did in fact tell Trooper J. W. Fleming of the Ohio State Highway Patrol in Interview #1264 on June 23, 1994. On that occasion Jefferson told Trooper Fleming: A. So I went to L-7, matter of fact I had a baseball bat with me.

Q. Was it an aluminum bat again?

A. Yeah, it was a Louisville Slugger. Steel bat.

Q. Okay, you're down --he's standing at the bottom of the steps? In front of the showers.

A. Standing at the bottom of the steps between 41 and the shower. I come downstairs, I didn't even ask no questions. I busted him in the back of the head with that old Louisville Slugger.

Q. In the back of the head? A. Back of the head.

Q. Now, right side or left side?

Q. I just swung. I know it hit the back of his head. I tell you what I know that the brain was leaking.

Interview #1264 at 16-20.

Prosecutor Crowe told the Jefferson jury to believe what Jefferson had told Trooper Fleming.

“If there was only one blow to the head of David Sommers, the strongest evidence you have [is that] this is the individual --I won't call him a human --this is the individual that administered that blow. Out of his own mouth. If there was only one blow, he's the one that gave it. He's the one that hit him like a steer going through the stockyard, the executioner with the pick axe, trying to put the pick through the brain. That put that baseball bat into the brain of David Sommers.”

Tr. at 657 (emphasis added).

The prosecution's conduct in convicting Skatzes and then Jefferson for the same offense (a single massive blow to the head that killed David Sommers) precisely parallels the prosecution's conduct in convicting Stumpf and then Wesley for the same offense (firing the bullets that killed Mary Jane Stout) .If the due process rights of Stumpf and Wesley to a fair trial were thereby violated, requiring reversal of their sentences 'and convictions, so were the due process rights of Skatzes and Jefferson.

Because this is a "constitutional issue," Motion to Dismiss at 4, the verdicts and sentences against Skatzes and Jefferson must be vacated.

Conclusion

George Skatzes was found guilty of the aggravated murder of Officer Vallandingham but was not given a death sentence. He is on Death Row solely in connection with his conviction for the aggravated murder of prisoners Elder and Sommers. Both these convictions having been shown to be invalid, Skatzes' death sentences must be set aside.

A Rude Awakening as to How the Justice System Really Works (2007)

I was convicted of three murders during the eleven-day rebellion at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville, Ohio in April 1993. When I tell people I was not guilty of any of them, they say: But weren't you at SOCF because you were already found to be guilty of a murder? So let me begin with that earlier conviction.

In the city of Bellefontaine, Ohio, in October of 1979, the manager of Rinks Department store was murdered. It would appear that this may have been an armed robbery gone bad. There is more than one theory as to what really happened in this case.

This case went unsolved for nearly three (3) years. Then in mid to late 1982 some inmates wanted to cut a deal to get out of the trouble they were in.

In the summer of 1982 a good snitching inmate doing time in London Ohio Correctional Institution called the Bellefontaine authorities and told them he had information concerning the murder that happened in their town in 1979.

The price for this information would be his freedom, which he gained. Plus other perks.

The next thing that happened, in October 1982 I was indicted for this robbery/murder.

There was no physical evidence whatsoever to link me to this crime.

Mr. Prosecutor used this inmate, one that was doing 37 to 130 years in Lucasville, Ohio's maximum security prison, and his wife to convict me.

Both of these people were indicted for this murder and several other crimes, but they cut a deal. They received immunity for all their crimes for testifying against me. The following questions and answers when Mr. Rogers testified against me are reported on page 1366 of the transcript:

Q. What would you do to keep from going to jail? Would you lie under oath? A. To --

Q. To prevent yourself from being convicted, punished, going to prison, would you lie under oath?

A. I certainly would. I have before.

Of course this is only a very short version of the deals, the injustice in my original conviction. My case is by no means unique or rare. The system is full of cases like mine.

To sum it up, I started out doing a life sentence, convicted of murder on the word of two (2) lying snitches! A good, honest review of the record of case number 83-CR-3, Logan County, Ohio would prove I am telling the truth!

In my opinion these convictions should not be able to stand. Inmate testimony alone put me on Death Row. These convictions were obtained by the use of bribery and intimidation of the inmate witnesses. A review of the record will prove this.

Inmate Lavelle turned state's evidence and testified against other convicts. Mr. Prosecutor told Lavelle, "You are either going to be my witness, or I'm going to try to kill you" (Transcript, p. 4047).

Transcript, p. 4047

How can this type of testimony be enough to convict anybody? 

The prosecutor also told the jury that if I had agreed to snitch, I would have been the witness and Lavelle would have been the defendant. These were his words: 

Transcript, p. 5751.

"Mr.Skatzes had his opportunity and he chose not to take it. Had Mr. Skatzes taken it, they're right. Mr.Skatzes, assuming he would tell us the truth, would be up there on the witness stand testifying and Mr.Lavelle could be sitting over there. I make no apologies for that." Transcript, p. 5751.

Ohio Revised Code 2923.03(D) states in part that:

"...the admitted or claimed complicity of a witness may affect his credibility and make his testimony subject to grave suspicion, and require that it be weighed with great caution."

One would think the above statement makes good common sense, but that is not so. When an inmate testifies for Mr. Prosecutor his word becomes the gospel.

Think about it: Should snitch testimony, uncorroborated by any physical evidence, be strong enough to send a person to his death?

Even before I was indicted for the murder of Earl Elder, statements were made as to who really murdered this man. The powers that be very well know I had nothing to do with the murder of Earl Elder, but since I would not snitch, I got charged and convicted, and sentenced to death.

One of the inmates who was involved in the Elder murder came to my trial and testified against me. This man is walking the streets free now.

Another inmate who was involved in the Elder murder was man enough to step up and confess to his crime. He got a life sentence this past June 6, 2006. Still I sit on Death Row as if this confession never took place.

I was also tried, convicted and sentenced to death for the alleged murder of inmate David Sommers. The cause of death, according to the coroner, was one (1) massive blow to the head.

In my trial I was the one who dealt the one massive blow that killed Mr. Sommers.

In another convict's trial for the murder of Mr. Sommers,

the prosecutor told the jury that he was the one who dealt that fatal blow.

The State's own evidence proves that I am not responsible for the murder of Mr.Sommers.

There is just so much to all this. I don't want to go overboard in trying to explain everything. All I can ask is that you please read about this case.

If you feel the evidence is there to convict and sentence me to death, so be it.

On the other hand, if you believe I am innocent, please help me. These courts will not do their job unless they are made to do so. People power, you getting behind me and making some noise, is the only way justice will be served.

I need the State of Ohio to look at my case with honesty and justice.

Please help me to achieve this.

With utmost Respect

George Skatzes
----
Published here and here.

Staughton and Alice Lynd's Letter to Judge Paul Pfeifer (2005)

Taken from: http://georgeskatzes.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=geoisinn&action=display&thread=79

STAUGHTON AND ALICE LYND
Attorneys-at-Law
...OH 44446-3941
Phone ...
Fax ...
E-Mail SALYND[@]aol.com

May 24, 2005

Historian and Attorney Challenges Supreme Court Fact-Finding in the Case of Leader of 1993 Lucasville Uprising Sentenced to Death.

Staughton Lynd, a lawyer and historian who lives in Niles, near Youngstown, has sent an "Open Letter" to Ohio Supreme Court Justice Paul Pfeifer, challenging Justice Pfeifer's fact-finding in the case of State v. Skatzes.

The letter of protest arises from the opinion Justice Pfeifer authored in State v. Skatzes (2004), 104 Ohio St.3d 195, decided Dec. 8, 2004, and from the column entitled "The Lucasville Prison Riot" that Justice Pfeifer caused to be circulated for publication on May 18, 2005. The column, like the opinion, concerns itself almost entirely with the alleged role of prisoner George Skatzes in the April 1993 disturbance.

Lynd concludes that in State v. Skatzes the Ohio Supreme Court has produced a factual narrative that: 

1. relies on the testimony of jailhouse informants, with no apparent attempt to assess the truth of the facts asserted by these inherently unreliable witnesses; 

2. does not cite to the record; 

3. contains disputed material facts that go to the guilt or innocence of George Skatzes with respect to all three murders for which he was convicted.

The unpersuasive fact-finding of the Court in this case is equally apparent in its decisions about other Lucasville prisoners sentenced to death (Robb, Sanders, Lamar), Lynd writes.

Before becoming an attorney, Lynd taught American history at Spelman College, Atlanta and Yale University, and was a candidate for president of the American Historical Association. He is a member of the Society of Friends, or Quakers.

In 2004 Temple University Press published Lynd's book, Lucasville: The Untold Story Of A Prison Uprising, available at Barnes & Noble stores throughout the state. He has arranged for a copy to be mailed to Justice Pfeifer.

Lynd urges Ohioans of all descriptions to join in calling for a moratorium on executions in Ohio while the disputed material facts in this and other capital cases are further examined.

AN OPEN LETTER TO OHIO SUPREME COURT JUSTICE PAUL PFEIFER

STAUGHTON AND ALICE LYND
Attorneys-at-Law
1694 Timbers Court
Niles, OH 44446-3941

May 24, 2005

Justice Paul E. Pfeifer
Supreme Court of Ohio

Dear Justice Pfeifer:

Let me introduce myself. I am an attorney licensed to practice in state and federal courts in Ohio. I am also an historian: I taught American history at Spelman College, Atlanta and Yale University, and have been a candidate for president of the American Historical Association. Finally, I am a member of the Society of Friends, or Quakers.

In 2004 Temple University Press published my book, Lucasville: The Untold Story Of A Prison Uprising, based on eight years of research. I have arranged for a copy to be mailed to you.

This is a letter of protest arising from the opinion you authored in State v. Skatzes (2004), 104 Ohio St.3d 195 (hereafter, the Opinion), and also from the column entitled "The Lucasville Prison Riot" (hereafter, the Column) that you circulated for publication on May 18, 2005. The Column, like the Opinion, concerns itself almost entirely with the alleged role of prisoner George Skatzes in the April 1993 disturbance.

I do not intend this communication as an attack and do not wish to harm you in any way. On the contrary, please understand this lengthy critique as a plea for your attention to serious flaws in Ohio's death penalty decisions. I believe that you are one of the more fair-minded state court judges in deciding capital cases. I believe that, for whatever reason, your opinions concerning Skatzes represent a departure from this norm. What I write may help to explain why State Rep. Shirley Smith, other legislators, and a significant section of the Ohio bar, seek a moratorium on executions in Ohio so that the way we make these life and death decisions can be more carefully considered.
Reliance on "snitch" testimony, central to the Lucasville convictions because of the absence of physical evidence, is one among many reasons for a moratorium.

Because you have caused your views to be distributed to the media, I feel compelled to do the same.

I

First of all, I object to your public comment through your Column on a case that may yet return to the Ohio Supreme Court on appeal from a state post-conviction verdict, has not been finally adjudicated in the federal courts, and could be remanded for further proceedings in Ohio courts. Canon 3(A)(6) of the Code of Judicial Conduct adopted in 1972 by the American Bar Association states:

A judge should abstain from public comment about a pending or impending proceeding in any court . . . .

Similarly, Canon 3(B)(9) of the Ohio Code of Judicial Conduct, amended effective May 1, 1997, states:

While a proceeding is pending or impending in any court, a judge shall not make any public comment that might reasonably be expected to affect its outcome or impair its fairness . . . .

The Preamble to the Ohio Code makes clear that: "When the text uses 'shall' or 'shall not,' it is intended to impose binding obligations the violation of which can result in disciplinary action." The Commentary on subsection (B)(9) dispels any doubt as to the continuing relevance of its prohibition: "The requirement that judges abstain from any public comment regarding a pending or impending proceeding continues during any appellate process and until final disposition" (emphasis added).

In my opinion, what you say in your Column should indeed reasonably be expected to affect the outcome and impair the fairness of future court proceedings. You refer to the actions of prisoners including George Skatzes as "foul deeds." You characterize the uprising as "the worst humankind has to offer." As I will demonstrate below, a number of your factual assertions are inaccurate.

II

Statements of fact in the Opinion and the Column are offered without citation to the record. Many of these statements are false or misleading. Insofar as these statements occur in the State v. Skatzes Opinion, they are especially prejudicial because they constitute determinations of factual issues by a State court and, as such, must be presumed to be correct in any future habeas proceeding in federal court. The habeas petitioner, in this case Skatzes, would "have the burden of rebutting the presumption by clear and convincing evidence." 28 U.S.C. ƒu 2254(e)(1).

Paragraph 3: The Rebellion Begins

According to Paragraph 3 of the Supreme Court Opinion in State v. Skatzes: 

"On the evening before the riot, April 10, high-ranking members of the Aryan Brotherhood, including Jason Robb, Dewey Bocook, and Freddie Snyder, and the Muslims, including Sanders and James Were, met in the L block gym. Upon seeing this, inmate Robert Brookover knew 'there was something going on.' Robb told fellow Aryan Brotherhood member Roger Snodgrass to 'be on our toes tomorrow'."

The reader is left to infer that Skatzes might have approved the riot in advance, or at least might have known about it. The record refutes any such inference. The Opinion fails to mention what Prosecutor Daniel Hogan stated to Skatzes' jury in closing argument: "No one has ever raised the issue of whether Mr. Skatzes planned this riot. The State certainly never alleged that." Tr. at 6096. Inmate Kenneth Hazlett testified that Skatzes was in his cell, catty-corner across from Hazlett in L-6, when the riot began. Tr. at 4722. According to inmate Tom Hurst, the riot caught Skatzes by surprise. Neither he nor Skatzes understood what was going on. Tr. at 5003. Everyone wanted to know what was happening, but Skatzes had no more answers than the rest of the inmates. Tr. at 5019. These witnesses corroborated Skatzes' unrebutted testimony that no one told him that a riot was going to break out, and that he was in his cell writing a letter when the riot began. Tr. at 5311-12, 5314-15.

Moreover, the meeting alleged by the Opinion to have occurred on the evening of April 10 is not as clear in the record as the Opinion suggests. Brookover and Snodgrass were prisoners who turned State's evidence. The jury instructions approved by the Supreme Court in this case indicate that the testimony of such persons should be assessed with care. Indeed, after the Robb trial, the State made a special investigation that called Brookover's credibility into question. But the Opinion does not hesitate to credit the facts testified to by these inherently unreliable witnesses.

Furthermore, Snodgrass did not testify to any meeting between Aryans and Muslims on April 10. He recalled a so-called "walk-around meeting in the gym" between Snyder (AB), Hasan (Muslims), and Anthony Lavelle of the Black Gangster Disciples, but did not mention a date. He also remembered an occasion when Snyder and Hasan talked on the diet line in the chow hall "probably about three weeks, maybe two, prior to the riot itself." Tr. at 4357-59. Neither Brookover nor Snodgrass were able to overhear anything that was said in any of these alleged encounters.

Paragraphs 4-5: The Early Hours of the Rebellion

In the Opinion's recital of events on the afternoon and evening of April 11, Skatzes is mentioned only in connection with the fact that a day or two later Aryan Brotherhood members moved into cell block L2 ("the Aryans, led by Jason Robb and Skatzes, controlled L2").

The Opinion reports, "Several corrections officers ('C.O.s'), including Robert Vallandingham, who was working in L1 that day, were taken hostage," but fails to mention that there was no testimony implicating George Skatzes in the taking of correctional officers as hostages on April 11, nor was he shown to have captured or locked up any prisoners.

The Opinion also states that "C.O.s Darrold Clark and Jeff Ratcliff . . . were confined for most of the riot in L2." It omits the testimony of prosecution witness Clark that, while under the control of Muslims in L6, he asked Skatzes to get him out. Skatzes left, came back and said, "You are going into my block," and took Clark to L2. Tr. at 2328-29. Clark himself testified that when he could not sleep he asked for George, that George got a mattress and laid down between him and the door, that is, between Clark and anyone who might come to harm him. Tr. at 2380-81; see also Tr. at 5152-53. According to prosecution witness Snodgrass, after Clark was transferred to L2 Skatzes
told him that he was going to do everything that he could to get him out of there. He told him that he didn't have nothing to worry about, that he wasn't going to let nothing happen to him, that he was safe. . . .
It came to where Clark would, when George was gone, Clark would be even more nervous and he would ask for George, where is George, where is George, I want to talk to George, and basically he wouldn't talk to no one else at times . . . .
Tr. at 4581.

Similarly, the Opinion says nothing about the fact that when Skatzes heard that Officer Ratcliff had been beaten by inmates, Skatzes came and got Ratcliff and took him to L2 also. Tr. at 5995A, 5999A-6000A. Skatzes removed the blindfold and some red tape from Ratcliff's eyes, took water, cotton balls and towels, and cleaned away a red substance that was burning Ratcliff's eyes. Tr. at 5145-46, 5199. Ratcliff testified, "[I]f he wouldn't have come and got me, I probably wouldn't be here, I would probably be dead." Tr. at 6000A. Judge Mitchell surmised that the reason Skatzes was not sentenced to death for the aggravated murder of Officer Vallandingham was because of Officer Ratcliff's testimony. Opinion of the Trial Court at 5.

The Opinion is also silent about Skatzes' very substantial activity during the early hours of the rebellion in saving the lives of hostage correctional officers, as to which both prosecution and defense witnesses testified.

The first person whose life Skatzes helped to save was Correctional Officer Harold Fraley. After the takeover, prosecution witness Snodgrass testified, he saw Skatzes screaming to correctional officers on the other side of the gates that there was a correctional officer who needed to be evacuated. Skatzes was saying: "He's hurt. He needs help. We need to get him out of here before he dies. . . . I am goin' to take him to the back of L-8 and I will put him there and you all better come and get him." Snodgrass saw Skatzes pick the man up and take him to the stairwell at the back of L8. Tr. at 4379-80; see also Tr. at 5911-16. State personnel retrieved Correctional Officer Fraley from the L8 stairwell at 4:45 p.m. Stipulation, Tr. at 6058; Tr. at 1858.

Inmate Dwayne Johnson described the efforts he and Skatzes made to save the lives of other officers on the first night of the riot. Johnson, Skatzes and other prisoners arranged for officers Kemper and Schroeder to be carried out to the yard where they could be picked up. Johnson said Skatzes stayed until the last guard was released from a makeshift infirmary in the L3 dayroom. This was at some personal risk because, as Johnson testified, it required going behind the backs of the leaders of the riot to get the injured officers out. Tr. at 5939-48; see also Tr. at 1858-59, 6040.

Skatzes did what he could to insure the safety and well-being of the guards who remained on L side as hostages. Negotiation tapes reveal that Skatzes made rounds to be sure that the hostage officers were safe, delivered food and water, delivered medication to officers Buffington and Dotson, and even offered Officer Dotson his own blood pressure medication. Tr. at 4219-20, 5995A; Neg. Tape #4, Ex. 295 (Ex. 295A at 4-5); Neg. Tape #5, Ex. 296 (Ex. 296A at 21); Neg. Tape #12, Ex. 303 (Ex. 303A at 29). (Exhibit numbers in parentheses are transcripts.)

Skatzes also saved the lives of prisoners. On the first night of the riot, Frank Williams saw Skatzes come into the L3 dayroom where the injured inmates were. He heard Skatzes say repeatedly, "Man, this is bad. These guys are hurt. Get these guys out of here." Tr. at 5048-49, 5062. Tim Williams, an inmate who testified for the prosecution, said that he was accused of being involved in a plot to kill Skatzes and a leader of the Muslims. When confronted by the Muslim leader, Skatzes said he did not think Williams had anything to do with it. Williams later told a Highway Patrol investigator that Skatzes helped to save his life. Tr. at 3087, 3195.

When prosecution witness Brookover went to Skatzes and asked whether he was going to be killed, Skatzes assured Brookover that he would not let that happen. Tr. at 3695. Brookover testified: "[N]o matter what George feels about me today, I believe in my heart he saved my life . . . ." Tr. at 3771; see also Tr. at 3480, 3490.

Paragraphs 6-7, 136-37: The Murder of Earl Elder

The Opinion and Column repeat, without evaluation, the prosecution theory that Skatzes ordered AB member Snodgrass to kill Elder and remained outside Elder's cell while "Snodgrass went into the cell and stabbed Elder numerous times."

Moreover, the Column states untruthfully that after Snodgrass supposedly emerged from Elder's cell, "Elder was dead." This statement is in conflict with the Opinion, which concedes that after the alleged stabbing a prisoner named Roper "told Snodgrass that Elder was not dead." Opinion at Paragraph 137. In fact Snodgrass, if indeed he did stab Elder, did not succeed in killing him. Prosecution witnesses Snodgrass and Tim Williams testified that Snodgrass stabbed Elder repeatedly with an icepick type shank. Tr. at 4395, 3072. The coroner, Dr. Tate, testified that an icepick type instrument made only superficial non-lethal wounds. Tr. at 4842-4845. The lethal injuries appeared to have been made with a "large edge" like a knife. Tr. at 4843, 4845. "When you use a knife, you get an elongated type injury," Dr. Tate explained. Tr. at 4842-43. "The large wounds going into the chest are all elongated, which makes it less likely to be an icepick or an auger type of instrument," Tr. at 4843, and "seemed to be [made with] a large edge," Tr. at 4845.

Snodgrass himself testified that Elder was still alive and moaning when Snodgrass came out of Elder's cell. Tr. at 4395, 4590-91. The fatal stabbing attack occurred afterwards. Tr. at 3076-77, 4550-51, 4590.

Of course, if Skatzes had anything to do with that later attack he would still be complicit in Elder's murder. But he did not. The Opinion asserts that when Roper told Snodgrass that Elder was still alive, Skatzes told Snodgrass that he (Skatzes) would "take care of it." Opinion at Paragraph 137. This is untrue.

Snodgrass' testimony was as follows:

Q. You said how Lucky Roper came back to the gym after you had been in L-6?
A. Yes.
Q. And yesterday I think you said that someone said, I'll take care of it. Is that Lucky?
A, Lucky said it. . . .
Tr. at 4590 (emphasis added). And again:
Q. And then sometime after that, he [Roper] came down to the gym and said he's still alive?
A. Yes.
Q. And then said he would take care of it?
A. Yeah.
Tr. at 4591 (emphasis added).

Paragraph 8: What Skatzes and Officer Ratcliff Did on April 12

The Opinion accurately recites that on April 12, prison authorities turned off the electricity and water in L block. It then states:
Skatzes shouted from a window with a bullhorn, demanding that the authorities turn the power back on. He also had C.O.-hostage Ratcliff identify himself using the bullhorn and demand that power be restored inside L block. [Emphasis added.]

The Court's version of events appears to be drawn from the testimony of prisoner David Lomache, a prosecution witness. See Tr. at 2521.
But Officer Ratcliff's own account of speaking on the bullhorn does not suggest that he felt coerced or that he considered he was asking for something that he did not himself want. The prisoners told Ratcliff that "they wanted me to speak to my fellow officers because I have been there the longest, they knew me and I could respond and say: I'm alive and I'm okay, and we need water and electric." In answer to the question, "Were you told what to say?" Ratcliff answered:

A. Well, I wasn't told. They said I should ask them if they would turn the water and electricity on so we could see. It was hard to get around the place, we tripped over people on the way up through there.

Ratcliff testified further, "I proceeded to give my message, which was nothing they wanted me to say. It was what I wanted to say." He was also asked at trial, "Were you feeling any pressure in there or it was just go ahead and talk to them, say whatever you want?" and answered, "No, just say what you got to say . . . ." Tr. at 5186-90.

Paragraph 10: Skatzes as Negotiator, April 12-14
The following is the totality of what the Opinion provides concerning Skatzes' activity as a negotiator before April 15:
During the first half of the riot, Skatzes was one of the lead inmate negotiators. He told the prison negotiators to stop tear-gassing K block, which they were doing to quell a disturbance, "or you are going to cost an officer's life." As he continued to argue with the authorities over the phone, Skatzes declared, "You just cost an officer's life." At that time, however, the inmates did not kill a guard.
This is a dramatically incomplete account.

On Monday, April 12, Skatzes accompanied by prisoner Cecil Allen went out on the yard with a bullhorn. According to prosecution witness Snodgrass, other prisoners were fearful that Skatzes might be shot but Skatzes volunteered with the purpose of starting negotiations and getting the riot over with. Tr. at 4564-66.

Skatzes became the principal telephone negotiator for the prisoners on Tuesday, April 13 and continued into the evening of Wednesday, April 14. "I'd like to see those officers get out of here," Skatzes said on April 14, and David Burchett, who was negotiating for the State, replied, "I know that you'd like to see them get out of here, because you care about them too. I know you do. So, you and I can work through this." Ex. 295A at 27-28. Skatzes argued that the safety of the officers depended greatly on being able to see what was going on around them. Ex. 295A at 33. Expressing hesitations about inmates talking to the news media, Burchett asked Skatzes, "How am I going to know that you're not going to hurt one of the news people?" Skatzes responded, "if I wanted to hurt somebody, I'd be in here cutting these hostages' heads off." Ex. 295A at 49. Skatzes also stated, "I'm trying to do everything I can do to assure the safety of these guards." Ex. 295A at 49. Skatzes asked Burchett, "Do you realize what that is to keep people from going off on one another and to keep peace in here and, and everything like that to keep these people from going at them guards?" Ex. 295A at 58. Responding to Burchett's concern that there were so many media that might want to talk to the inmates, Skatzes said, "We're not worrying about hurt feelings, because somebody didn't get to be first. We're worried about lives in here." Ex. 296A at 18.

On the evening of April 14, Skatzes and Burchett agreed that in the morning two hostages would be released in exchange for a live media broadcast by the prisoners. Even according to Sergeant Hudson, principal investigator for the State, spirits were elevated on both sides. Tr. at 2158-61; Ex. 296A at 22-26. Unfortunately this negotiated accord was repudiated at a meeting of gang leaders the next morning.

Paragraph 11: The Hole in the Wall of L7

According to the Court's version of events, at some point during the siege Skatzes and Robb ordered a crew of inmates to make a hole in a back wall of L7. They planned to kill a C.O. and dangle his body out of the back of L7 where it could be seen from the front of the SOCF by members of the media.
Thus, the hole in the L7 wall alleged in the Opinion was a hole in an outside wall through which an object could be lowered and made visible to media outside L block.

A hole was made in the back wall of L7 but, three prosecution witnesses indicate, it was not made in an outside wall and was for a purpose entirely different than displaying the dead body of a guard. Sergeant Hudson, lead investigator for the State, testified that the hole was "where they had pounded through walls down into the tunnels," and referred to "the area where the walls were breached and they gained access to the tunnel below L-7." Tr. at 1977 (emphasis added). FBI agent Marc Hopper agreed that the breach in the L-7 wall went "down into the tunnel." Tr. at 2433. Prisoner Tim Williams, a prosecution witness, was the most specific. The hole was in the unit manager's office at the back of the block. It was a hole about "two to three feet in height and about three feet wide." He said that the hole was put there because the prisoners "wanted to tap into the pipes that was down in the pipe chase to get water." And finally:

Q. Do you know who was involved in making that hole?
A. Stick Man [Salyers], Doc Creager and somebody else . . . .
Q. Do you know who gave them the orders?
A. No, but I know who was there issuing orders after awhile. It was Namir or Elmore.
Tr. at 3109-10.

Paragraph 12: The Purported Meeting of April 14

The Court's narrative describes a meeting on April 14 at which, "[a]ccording to Lavelle, a vote was taken to kill a guard if their demands were not met." Skatzes is said to have attended the meeting and not to have spoken against the decision.

No one other than Lavelle testified so specifically about a meeting on April 14, and even Lavelle stated that no guard was selected to be killed and no detailed plans were made as to how the killing would be done, nor could he recall that a time for the murder was agreed to. Tr. at 3856-57. And very much in contrast to a similar meeting the next morning, April 15, although FBI recording equipment was in place there is no objective record of the meeting Lavelle thought he remembered. Indeed, there is every reason to believe that Lavelle confused the supposed meeting of April 14 with the meeting that took place the next day.

The significant happening on the morning of April 14, not mentioned in the Opinion, was a statement at a press conference by State representative Tessa Unwin to which prisoners listened on battery-powered radios. Unwin was asked about a message painted on a sheet hung out of L block windows to the effect that a guard would die if the authorities ignored prisoners' demands. She responded, "They've been threatening something like this from the beginning. It's part of the language of the negotiation."

All sources -- including prisoner informants David Lomache and Anthony Lavelle, Tr. at 2530-31, 3860-61, and hostage Officer Larry Dotson, who, although blindfolded, could sense the increase in tension around him -- agree that Ms. Unwin's remark caused many prisoners to feel that they were not being taken seriously, and set the stage for Officer Vallandingham's murder the next day.

Paragraphs 13, 139: Skatzes' Alleged Statement, "I Will Kill the CO"

Skatzes is supposed to have made this statement to Hasan on the evening of April 14. This is perhaps the most striking example of the tendency in the Opinion to select the testimony most damaging to Skatzes, and to set it forth as fact without any effort to assess its truthfulness. If one makes such an attempt one finds:

1. The sole witness to Skatzes' alleged statement was a prisoner named Miles Hogan. Hogan was cross-examined about his previous description of the incident when interviewed by representatives of the Ohio State Highway Patrol in January 1994, before trial. It was pointed out to him that in January 1994 he did not attribute these words to Skatzes but merely said that Skatzes was standing there at the time.
Q. [Y]ou didn't say that George Skatzes said anything like that, right?
A. I may not have.
Tr. at 3015. In fact, Hogan conceded that in the 1994 interview
he confused Stanley Cummings with Siddique Abdullah Hasan, and confused Siddique Abdullah Hasan with Anthony Lavelle. Tr. at 3016-17.

2. Hogan testified that Skatzes made his alleged remark "around nine or ten o'clock" the evening of April 14. But the State's own records show that Skatzes was negotiating on the telephone at this time: the transcript of Negotiation Tape #5 states expressly that Skatzes and prison negotiator Dave Burchett were talking on the telephone from 8:23 p.m. to 10:50 p.m. Ex. 296A at 1. Moreover, the transcript shows that the two negotiators ended the evening in a state of exhausted mutual congratulation because, so they had agreed, two hostages were to be released the next day.

Paragraphs 14-15, 140-41: The Meeting of April 15

The Opinion asserts that between 8 and 9 a.m. on the morning of April 15 there was a meeting of gang leaders at which "a vote was taken to kill a C.O., and a member from each inmate gang was chosen to participate in the killing."

Additionally the Opinion states, "According to witnesses at the meeting, Skatzes agreed with the decision to kill a C.O." The Column says that "Skatzes and the others voted to kill a guard if their demands were not met."

Finally, according to the Opinion, after Officer Vallandingham was murdered "Skatzes walked behind those who carried the body" to the yard.
Every one of these assertions is unsupported or dubious. It is true that the April 15 meeting repudiated the agreement Skatzes had negotiated the previous evening for the release of two hostage officers. It is not true that the meeting decided to kill a guard.

There was no vote to kill a C.O. The FBI taped the April 15 meeting. The transcript of that tape is part of the record as Ex. 322A. The following are the only references in the transcript to votes and decisions.

Ex. 322A at 2. Stanley Cummings, who appears to have chaired the meeting, states:

. . .[W]hen I said that I would ask for a show of hands. I want to hear a voice. When we leave up out of here this morning, let's have this established. All three things. Going to the phone. All that what we talked about in the past concessions.
There is nothing here about killing an officer. Cummings' reference to "all three things" is clarified by his next words:
Let's this be the format. . . . We might have to sit a day or two to do that. Stall to them. We might have to tighten our own belts like they been doing us. Let the first business be our first format for the day. Water, electricity, turn it back on. . . . People up underneath this basement [of the occupied cell block] out from down there. Let this be our first format.
This was a vote on negotiating demands for the day, not about a murder.
Ex. 322A at 15. Cummings summarizes the 45 minute discussion as follows:
Okay, we can but we can sit down and come back in and we put the non-negotiable things up then we came back with the time element that we give them to do it. Hey Jason, ahh, Hasan, why don't we put the non-negotiable things up, George, go back in. Talking about the hardliners came up with non-negotiable things. Then we going to set down and go over the time element, if they don't do these things. . . if you don't do these things, the non-negotiable things we going with the time element, then we going to kill them one. Then we open up negotiations again. I mean, is everybody in agreement on that? (Emphasis added.)

In its statement of facts in State v. Robb (2000), 88 Ohio St.3d 59, 62, the Court used certain words taken from the foregoing paragraph to argue that Cummings' statement proved a vote to kill a guard. On the contrary, Cummings projected a second meeting at which participants would "set down and go over the time element" before a guard was to be killed.
Anthony Lavelle, the prosecution's principal witness concerning the April 15 meeting, testified explicitly in State v. Skatzes that "we was going to meet back up later on that afternoon" before making a final decision to kill a guard.

Q. What you are saying is that when you left the meeting on the fifteenth there had been talk of killing a guard, there had been talk of these demands, there had been talk of deadlines, ultimatums, correct?
A. Yes.
Q. But the conversation among the inmates, including yourself, progressed beyond that to the notion of a meeting that afternoon to decide what to do, correct?
A. That's correct.
Q. When you left that meeting, in your mind, there had not been a final decision made to kill a guard?
A. That's correct.
Tr. at 4067 (emphasis added.)

Skatzes did not agree with killing a Correctional Officer; according to prosecution witness Snodgrass, Skatzes was the only participant in the April 15 meeting who expressed misgivings.
The prosecutor asked Snodgrass about Skatzes' participation in the discussion of killing a guard at the April 15 meeting.
A. . . . [T]here was one time when Mr. Skatzes made a comment personally about how he felt about the situation.
Q. What did he say?
A. He said -- well, he put it across like, look brothers, I'm with you; don't get me wrong now, I'm with you, but, you know, before we do this, we better give this a lot of thought because once you kill the correctional officer, it is going to change the whole ball game. In other words, he was trying to dissuade them or make them think of another alternative. . . .
Q. . . . Tell me now who were the people that voted to kill the guard?
A. The only one that actually spoke up anything to the contrary was Mr. Skatzes.
Tr. at 4435-36.

The allegation that a member of each gang was chosen to take part in a killing contradicts the State's own evidence.
This supposed fact appears to be drawn from the testimony of a prisoner informant named Stacey Gordon.
The April 15 meeting ended just before 9 a.m. and the murder of Officer Vallandingham appears to have occurred between 10:30 and 11 a.m. Gordon says that "Robb was on the phone talking to a negotiator, and they eventually got into an argument, real heated exchange, where they slammed the phone down a couple of times." Tr. at 4253. However, the State's own transcripts indicate that Skatzes was the only prisoner who negotiated on the telephone that morning. Gordon was apparently under the mistaken impression that Robb was the prisoners' negotiator that morning and that "me and George Skatzes, we was securing the phones." Tr. at 4253.
Equally implausible is Gordon's account of how Skatzes acted as doorkeeper for the death squad, letting them into L2 and then informing them, one or two hours later, that they would not be needed. Tr. at 4254, 4256. According to the State's own evidence, Skatzes was negotiating on the telephone all this time.

Skatzes could not have walked behind those who carried Officer Vallandingham's body to the yard because he was still negotiating on the telephone or at the cell of Officer Ratcliff.

Notes taken by officers who were listening in on the telephone negotiations from the tunnels underneath L block report the following:

10:45 Skatzes talking -- not clear . . .
10:50 Still talking. Phone rings . . . . Talking about last night's deal [between Burchett and Skatzes for the release of two hostages]. Phone rings again while Skatzes talking. . . .
10:53 Background voice said something about a dead body.
Defense Ex. D. These notes were recorded by Officer Richard Cunningham. See Tr. at 2195-96.
There is an additional page of notes by Officer Cunningham that was not entered into evidence. It records that Skatzes was still talking on the telephone after 11 a.m.
10:54 Skatzes talking on phone. Appears to be negotiating with someone . . . .
10:55 Skatzes still talking. Phone rings once while Skatzes talks.
11:02 Skatzes still talking on phone. Content unclear. Seems to be dealing with demands and how to work them out.. . . Seems to be talking about turning power on. "Wasting valuable time."
11:06 Off phone (I believe). No more of Skatzes' voice.

According to an observation by Lieutenant Newsome in Tower 5, also not entered into evidence, at 11:05 a.m. he observed "4 black inmates dragging a sheet containing ? [sic] from M2 gym door. Back in M2 gym door and secured at 11:09."
There is a second reason for believing that Skatzes did not accompany Officer Vallandingham's body to the yard. It will be recalled that Skatzes had moved Officer Ratcliff into a cell in L2. Ratcliff was asked how he learned about Officer Vallandingham's death. He answered:

A. George came up to the cell, and he sat there and he wasn't hisself, you know, usually, he would be a different way, and he was quiet. We was like: What's wrong? What's going on? . . .
Inmate came up and asked to speak to George privately out of our cell, and he went out. He come back. He said: Man, I can't believe it. He just -- I can't act the way he was acting when it happened. He come in, he had his head down, he was rubbing his head, he said: I can't believe this, I can't believe it happened. I said: What? He says, I think they really did a guard. . . .
Tr. at 5157-58.
Ratcliff testified that, at Skatzes' suggestion, Skatzes, Officer Ratcliff, Officer Clark, and one of two other prisoners then got on the floor, held hands, and prayed. Tr. at 5159. Officer Clark corroborated this testimony. Tr. at 2353.

Paragraphs 14, 140: The Words "Guaranteed Murder"

Both the Opinion and the Column stress the fact that when Skatzes resumed telephone negotiations after the April 15 meeting, he demanded that water and electricity be turned back on or there would be a "guaranteed murder." It is true that he used those words. It is also true that, read in context, their evident intent was to try to save life.

Skatzes testified that he went to the phone when the morning meeting ended. He had been told what to say. He was trying to get the State's negotiator to understand that the threat was real. He was worried that a correctional officer would die and in absolute frustration he used the words, "guaranteed murder": the State feared that if water and electricity were turned on, someone might be electrocuted; but if they were not turned on, Skatzes realistically predicted, an officer would be killed. Tr. at 2238, 5377-83.

The fragmentary record supports Skatzes' recollection.

Sergeant Hudson himself was at the command post at this time, and he read into the record his notes on the conversation between Skatzes and negotiator Dirk Price beginning at 9:35 a.m. Tr. at 2235-39. When Skatzes returned to the telephone as instructed, he predicted that an officer would be killed if the water and electricity were not turned back on. Tr. at 5380-81; Neg. Tape #6, Ex. 297 (Ex. 297A at 2); Defense Ex. A. Skatzes stated further that he could not negotiate anything else until the inmates had water and electricity. Price expressed a concern that there was a question of safety because of electric damage, to which Skatzes responded that there was no electric damage and he knew what would happen if the electricity were not turned on. Tr. at 2237-38.
At 10:19 a.m. Skatzes alerted the State, "If you don't get the lights and water on, there's going to be a dead hostage." Tr. 2195. This same patch of conversation was recorded on Negotiation Tape #6. A fragment catches these words by Skatzes, Ex. 297A at 2:

I stress to you, . . . if you turn this on, you, you think you might electrocute somebody. . . . If you don't turn it on, it's a guaranteed murder.

Paragraphs 20-21, 143-45: The Murder of David Sommers

The Opinion's narrative of the murder of David Sommers on April 21 begins with the statement: "during a meeting in L2 between Robb, Lavelle, and Sanders, the gang leaders decided that inmate David Sommers, who controlled the phones and ran the inmates' tape player throughout the negotiations 'had to die, he knew too much'." Continuing, the Opinion declares: "Brookover [,] . . . Skatzes, Snodgrass, and Bocook . . . changed into different clothes. . . . Skatzes struck Sommers in the head with a baseball bat at least three times. . . . The coroner attributed death to a massive blow on the head."
There are several problems with this narrative.

There is no evidence of prior intent by Skatzes to kill Sommers. Skatzes was not part of the reported meeting of "gang leaders" about Sommers. Even if intent can be inferred from a change of clothes, prosecution witness Snodgrass was unclear whether Skatzes was among those who changed clothes on April 21. Snodgrass testified: "I can't say if Mr. Skatzes did or not." Tr. at 4480. Finally, Snodgrass also testified that the intent of whichever Aryans went to L7 on April 21 was not to kill Sommers, but was directed at three other prisoners, Tr. at 4477, and Ohio law does not contemplate transferred intent from one victim to another.

In another trial the State designated another prisoner as the man who struck the massive blow that killed Sommers. Brookover testified that Bocook, Jefferson, and he himself each struck Sommers with a baseball bat. Tr. at 3506, 3543, 3564. And in the later trial of Aaron Jefferson, Prosecutor Crowe told the jury:

If there was only one blow to the head of David Sommers, the strongest evidence you have [is that] this is the individual -- I won't call him human -- this is the individual that administered that blow. . . . If there was only one blow, he's [Jefferson] the one that gave it. He's the one that hit him like a steer going through the stockyard, the executioner with the pick axe, trying to put the pick through the brain.
State v. Jefferson, Tr. at 656-57 (emphasis added).

III

I have sought to show that in State v. Skatzes the Ohio Supreme Court produced a factual narrative that: 

1. relies on the testimony of jailhouse informants, with no apparent attempt to assess the truth of the facts asserted by these inherently unreliable witnesses; 

2. does not cite to the record; 

3. contains disputed material facts that go to the guilt or innocence of George Skatzes with respect to all three murders for which he was convicted.

The unpersuasive fact-finding of the Court in this case is equally apparent in its decisions about other Lucasville prisoners sentenced to death (Robb, Sanders, Lamar).

Clearly the deficiencies in these decisions go to the general process by which defendants are sentenced to death in Ohio. The juries in capital cases make no findings of fact. The opinions of trial court judges are cursory and, to be frank, are riddled with errors. The judges of Ohio appellate courts find facts but have no opportunity to witness the demeanor and assess the credibility of witnesses.

This is why, as an historian as well as an attorney, I believe further inquiry is merited. I urge Ohioans of all descriptions to join in calling for a moratorium on executions in Ohio while the disputed material facts in this and other capital cases are further examined.

Sincerely,

Staughton Lynd