In 1885, the Ohio State Legislature enacted laws which required all further executions in the state to be carried out at the Ohio State Penitentiary in Columbus, Ohio.  In the ensuing eleven year period from July 31, 1885 until April 29, 1896, twenty eight condemned men met their demise when the trap doors of the gallows were released in Ohio's first death chamber. (Ohio executions by hanging).

In 1897, the electric chair became the method of choice for executions in the state of Ohio.  This procedure delivers 1,950 volts of electricity through the human body for a period of 60 seconds, and was thought to be more humane than breaking a man's neck by dropping him through the floor of the gallows.  Thus it was that on April 27, 1897, the first legal electrocution took place in the state of Ohio when 17 year old, William Haas, earned the dubious distinction of being the first to take his seat in "Old Sparky" as Ohio's electric chair has been aptly named.  

Execution by electrocution would remain the method of choice for legally sanctioned murder in Ohio for the next sixty-six years.  From 1897 to 1963,  312 men and 3 women were put to death in Ohio's electric chair. On March 15, 1963, 29 year old Donald L. Reinbolt was "Old Sparky's" last victim, having paid the ultimate price for the murder of Edgar L. Weaver, a Columbus, Ohio, grocer. The option of death by electrocution was eliminated in Ohio on November 21, 2001 when Governor Bob Taft signed legislation making lethal injection the only form of execution in the State of Ohio.

Prior to this, a bill giving inmates the option to choose between death by lethal injection or by electrocution was passed by the General Assembly and signed into law by Governor George Voinovich on July 2, 1993.  Under this law the inmate was asked to choose his own poison so to speak.  Some time before his scheduled execution date the inmate was asked to sign a form stating which method of execution he chose . If he refused to choose, the State of Ohio, somewhat surprisingly, proceeded with execution by electrocution.  But, as was said earlier, the condemned can no longer, "choose his own poison."

In 1972, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the then existing laws governing the use of capital punishment in this country were unconstitutional. (Furman v. Georgia,  408 U.S. 238 (1972) As a result of that historic decision 65 Ohio death sentenced inmates had their sentences commuted to life in prison. 

Undaunted by the ruling of the United States Supreme Court in Furman, The Ohio General Assembly undertook a revision of the death penalty laws in Ohio and in 1974 presented a new capital punishment sentencing scheme to the Supreme Court justices for their review.  This new sentencing scheme also failed to pass constitutional muster and was rejected by the Supreme Court in 1978.  As a result of this most recent rejection, an additional 100 men and 4 women escaped the electric chair when their death sentences were commuted to life in prison as well. 

Determined to enact a sentencing scheme that would withstand constitutional scrutiny, Ohio lawmakers, once again, went back to their legal drawing boards and drafted new legislation that would meet the strict guidelines imposed by the court.  This new legislation went into effect on October 19, 1981, effectively breathing new life into Ohio's death machinery.  Leonard Jenkins, convicted of murdering a Cleveland police officer during a robbery, on October 21, 1981 was the first man sentenced under Ohio's current law. 

In February of 1995, death row was moved from the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville, Ohio, to the newly constructed Mansfield Correctional Institution in Mansfield, Ohio.  The death house and death chamber remain housed at the Lucasville facility.  Currently there are 212* men and one woman under a sentence of death in Ohio.  Donna Roberts of Trumbull County was sentenced to death in June of 2003 and is incarcerated at the Ohio Reformatory for Women in Marysville, Ohio.

Before he left office in January of 1991, then Governor, Richard F. Celeste, commuted to life in prison the death sentences of four men and four women, including that of Leonard Jenkins.  The Franklin County Court of Common Pleas subsequently determined that seven of these eight commutations were improperly granted, including that of Jenkins and the death sentences were reinstated and the inmates returned to death row on February 14, 1992.  However, upon appellate review, the decision of the Franklin Country Court was overturned and the commutations were allowed to stand and the seven clemencies were re-instated.  Leonard Jenkins remains incarcerated at the North Central Correctional Institution in Marion, Ohio.

* Timothy Dunlap is under a sentence of death in Ohio but is currently incarcerated in Idaho, under a sentence of death there as well.