Court Opinion

ID: 9573386
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:54:05.511344+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:40:48.105136
License: Public Domain

MERRITT, Circuit Judge,
with whom
MARTIN, Circuit Judge, joins,
dissenting.
I dissent from the failure to grant Jason Getsy a stay of execution until the case can be fully heard by the court in a deliberative and careful way, or, failing that, until the Supreme Court of the United States has an opportunity to consider the case. The decision not to stay Getsy’s imminent execution adds one final, absurd injustice to this court’s complete mishandling of his case.
1. Last week, a divided panel of this court concluded that Cooey v. Strickland, 479 F.3d 412 (6th Cir.2007) (“Cooey II”) required us to find that Getsy’s challenge to Ohio’s 2009 alterations to its lethal-injection protocol somehow became time barred in 2003, six years before the alterations took place and five years before the *322new Supreme Court decision setting out a new Eighth Amendment standard in such cases. As I explained in dissent, this holding unnecessarily and unconscionably expanded Cooey II, turning it into an insuperable bar to any § 1983 challenge to the state’s lethal injection protocol. See Getsy v. Strickland, No. 08-4199 (6th Cir. Aug. 13, 2009) (Merritt, J., dissenting) (attached as Exhibit “A”). The court’s deceptive attempt to say that some unknown, undescribed future case might not be time barred, if the challenged alterations are sufficiently egregious, improperly conflates the merits of the case with the statute of limitations, and is not even consistent with the Cooey II case or any other case in the legal canon.
Given this situation, it is incomprehensible to me that we would refuse to stay Getsy’s execution until the decision is final. It should be noted that all three members of the panel agreed that if Cooey II in fact required us to dismiss Getsy’s case as time barred, that rule would be utterly illogical and would require immediate revisitation, either by the en banc court or the Supreme Court. Staying Getsy’s execution for the few extra days that those two courts would require to act is the least we can do. This is particularly true when the recency of the panel decision, combined with a sua sponte call for en banc review, have made it difficult for Getsy’s lawyers to seek Supreme Court review. If, after reasoned deliberation, both courts decide to leave this holding undisturbed, then the execution could go forward. Refusing to wait until such reasoned deliberation takes place is not just procedurally inappropriate, but patently unjust.
2. The Supreme Court of Ohio has said that Getsy’s death sentence was grossly disproportionate to the lesser sentence imposed on the most culpable of the conspirators' — -the man who conceived, planned, paid for and participated in the crime. I have previously pointed out this unprecedented injustice in the en banc dissent joined by five other judges. It is attached as Exhibit “B.”
3. The parole board of the State of Ohio has issued a strong, reasoned recommendation that the Governor commute Getsy’s sentence to life. The Governor, facing an impending election, refused after the local District Attorney publicly protested.
Exhibit “A”
No. 08-4199

Getsy v. Strickland, et al.