Execution is Ohio’s first since 2014

Child killer put to death without complications.

LUCASVILLE, OHIO — A child killer was put to death with no apparent complications Wednesday in Ohio’s first execution since a problem-plagued one 3½ years ago triggered an uproar over the reliability of the lethal injection drugs used by the state.

Ronald Phillips, 43, was condemned to die for the 1993 rape and slaying of his girlfriend’s 3-year-old daughter, Sheila Marie Evans. He was given a three-drug combination never used in Ohio before.

As he lay on the execution table, he apologized to the child’s aunt and half-sister, who were there to watch him die for his crimes.

“I know that Sheila Marie didn’t deserve what I did to her,” he said.

Donna Hudson, the victim’s aunt, said: “God forgave him, but, I’m sorry, I don’t think I can.”

Phillips’ case could open the way for the full resumption of capital punishment in Ohio, which has 26 executions scheduled through 2020, the next on Sept. 13.

“I have confidence that we are going to continue to do this in a dignified, peaceful, humane way, and I’m committed to do that,” Ohio Prisons Director Gary Mohr said just before Phillips’ execution.

It was Ohio’s first execution since 2014, when an inmate gasped and snorted repeatedly during a procedure that took an unusually long 26 minutes and involved a never-before-tried drug combination.

Gov. John Kasich reacted by putting all executions on hold. The delays continued when the state had trouble finding new supplies of drugs and death row inmates sued over Ohio’s proposed new three-drug combination, saying it would amount to cruel and unusual punishment.

The drugs include midazolam, a sedative used in some problematic executions in Ohio, Arkansas and Arizona.