This week’s US elections brought relief for those in Ohio who oppose the death penalty: the new Governor-elect, Democrat Dr Amy Acton, has committed to maintaining the moratorium on executions begun by the incumbent, Governor Mike DeWine. Acton’s Republican opponent, Vivek Ramaswamy, would have restarted executions had he won.

Acton’s stance means those on Ohio’s death row can relax a little. They no longer have to contemplate the imminent prospect of fellow inmates disappearing, to be subjected to an unknown degree of pain while being killed by the state.

Governor Mike DeWine will remain in office until January 11, 2027. DeWine recently spoke out against the death penalty, which he no longer believes is a deterrent. He decried the harm that the death penalty inflicts on victims’ families and prison staff. It is not known whether the Governor will follow up his statement with action before he leaves office e.g. by granting more clemency requests.*

For Jeffrey Wogenstahl, the election has brought additional relief: Judge Christian Jenkins, who presided over Jeff’s evidentiary hearing over two years ago, has been re-elected. The judge’s decision about Jeff’s case is expected soon.

Jeff recently reminded Judge Jenkins that his decision should focus only on whether newly disclosed evidence undermines confidence in the trial verdict. He reiterated the many points that indicate an unfair trial based on “a prosecution built on omissions and misconduct”. He added that the United States Supreme Court recently clarified that post-trial DNA testing should be excluded from judgments such as this; even if the minute speck of blood found in Jeff’s car had been handled and stored correctly (which it wasn’t), the post-trial testing of this speck would be irrelevant to Judge Jenkins’s decision.

We hope Judge Jenkins makes it resoundingly clear that misconduct must not dominate the operation of legal process. We hope his decision is issued without further delay. And we trust that Jeff will at long ­­­­­­last receive the justice he so soundly deserves.

* ‘Just one week before publicly voicing his support for abolition, Gov. DeWine issued his first clemency in a death penalty case. On June 8, the governor reduced Gregory Lott’s death sentence to life without parole. Mr. Lott was sentenced to death in 1987. In 2020, Ohio’s Parole Board recommended by a 6 – 2 vote that he be granted clemency. The prosecution and defense in Mr. Lott’s case both agree that Mr. Lott has intellectual disability and therefore cannot be legally executed. However, in 2025, a Cuyahoga County court found that, under the legal doctrine of res judicata, it could not rule on the issue of Mr. Lott’s intellectual disability or grant him relief.
In the order granting clemency, Gov. DeWine also noted that “the family members of the victim, who represented themselves as speaking for the entire family, are opposed to the implementation of the death penalty.”’ Death Penalty Information Center, June 18, 2026