Ohio Death Row Inmate Billy Slagle Found Hanged Days Before Execution
An Ohio death row inmate scheduled to be executed on Wednesday was found hanged in his cell this weekend. Billy Slagle reportedly hanged himself early Sunday morning and was pronounced dead an hour after being found.
According to reports, Slagle had been on death row since 1988, after being found guilty of murdering his neighbor Mari Anne Pope by stabbing her 17 times with a pair of scissors. The two children she was taking care of that night heard the entire attack. The kids told authorities that they had heard Pope praying before hearing her screams and cries for help.
The prosecution and defense teamed up to try and spare Slagle's life, stating that he should not have been sentenced to death when he was 18. At the time, the jury only had the option of the death penalty or life in prison with the possibility of parole. Jurors did not want Slagle to go free and decided to sentence him to death.
Get Our Latest News for FREE
"I'm neither inherently evil nor a bad person, but rather someone that has made a terrible mistake and wishes that I could take that night all back," Slagle wrote in a statement to the parole board.
Prosecutors and members of Slagle's defense team argued that he was raised in a family dealing with alcoholism and domestic abuse. They maintained that he should not have received the death penalty but that there was no other option for the jury at the time. However, the parole board and Governor John Kasich denied his request for pardon and scheduled the execution for this coming Wednesday.
"He was in his cell alone," prison spokeswoman JoEllen Smith told CBS. "No other inmates suspected to be involved. It does appear to be a suicide. He was not yet placed under constant watch."
Prisoners are normally placed under "execution watch" in the days leading up to the event. Slagle was due to be moved on Sunday morning but killed himself before he could be moved.
