Condemned killer holds modern record for delays with 7 reprieves

[The Straight Story]

Condemned killer holds modern record for delays with 7 reprieves

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) -- The scenario has become almost routine for condemned killer John Spirko.

An Ohio governor issues a reprieve, three or four months pass while DNA tests are conducted on crime evidence, the attorney general asks for additional time for testing, and another reprieve is issued.

Spirko, 61, was sentenced to death row in 1982 for the slaying of a northwest Ohio postmistress and has been on Ohio's death row almost half his life.

He holds the record for the number of times an inmate has been spared an execution date under the state's new death penalty law, which took effect in 1981.

Gov. Ted Strickland granted Spirko's seventh reprieve late last month so his lawyers and the state can further study evidence in the death of Betty Jane Mottinger. Mottinger was abducted and repeatedly stabbed, then wrapped in a tarp and dumped in a field where her body was found three weeks after her death.
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