COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — A condemned inmate is seeking mercy ahead of his scheduled execution next month for killing a woman who was stabbed more than 100 times, then had her hands cut off.
Brett Hartman came within about a week of being executed in 2009 before a federal appeals court allowed him to pursue an innocence claim.
He got a new execution date last year, then won a reprieve when Gov. John Kasich postponed it because of a federal court case over the state's execution policy.
The 38-year-old Hartman's attorneys plan to tell the Ohio Parole Board Wednesday Hartman is innocent.
The board has denied two prior requests for mercy, citing the brutal murder of 46-year-old Winda Snipes of Akron in 1997 and the "overwhelming evidence" of Hartman's guilt.
