February 26

Ohio's Electric Chair Becomes History

State prison officials plan to dismantle Ohio's electric chair on Tuesday and remove it from the death house at the Lucasville penitentiary. Eventually, the chair will be shipped to the Ohio Historical Society.

Ohio's electric chair, also known as "Old Sparky," put 312 men and women to their deaths, NewsChannel5 reported.

The chair was first built and used in 1897. It replaced the gallows that were used when hanging was the means of execution.

Its inventor, Dr. David Rockwell (right), was from Milan, Ohio -- the same city where Thomas Edison was born.

According to NewChannel5, Rockwell felt it was indecent to hang people. He believed the electric chair would be quicker, less painful and more humane.

There have been a lot of stories about people who died in the chair. But NewsChannel5 said that the one that stands out as the most ironic was the execution of Charles Justice (left) on Nov. 9, 1911.

 "At the turn of the century, Justice was a prison inmate in Columbus and helped build and install Ohio's only electric chair," a NewsChannel5 reporter explained. "He served his time, was released from prison, but returned to prison 13 years later and died in the same electric chair that he helped build."

 The first person to die in Ohio's electric chair was 17-year-old Willie Haas (right) in 1897. NewChannel5 reported that he was convicted for raping and murdering a farmer's wife in Cincinnati.

 The last person electrocuted in Ohio, Donald Reinbolt (below, left), was put to death in 1963.

 Among the witnesses was Al Orton. He was a reporter for The Associated Press.

 "There's a wall with a few little holes in it. Peepholes, I think, and the warden just looked over there, nodded and zap he lurched in the chair. There was a big humming noise. He lurched in the chair. They gave him about three jolts. I understand the first one killed him, but I guess they were making sure," Orton recalled.

 When the death penalty was reinstated in 1981 inmates were given a choice of electrocution or lethal injection. The state has since changed to lethal injection as the primary means of execution and recently removed electrocution as an option on Nov. 21, 2001.

 Ohio has executed three men in the past two years, all by lethal injection.

 The last Ohio inmate to be executed was John W. Byrd Jr., who was put to death on Feb. 19, 2002, for the 1983 stabbing death of a Cincinnati convenience store clerk. Byrd was put to death by lethal injection despite a request to be executed in the electric chair.