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Staff report
WARREN -- The Warren-based 11th District Court of Appeals issued two rulings this week that again refused to allow death row inmate Danny Lee Hill of Warren to challenge his death sentence on the grounds that he is intellectually disabled.
In separate decisions, the court struck down Hill's "motion to certify a conflict" and his "application for reconsideration" of the 11th District's Aug. 17 decision that affirmed that Hill is not intellectually disabled, according to a Trumbull County Prosecutor's office news release.
Trumbull County Prosecutor Dennis Watkins, Assistant Prosecutor Charles Morrow and Special Assistant Stephen Maher of the Ohio Attorney General's Office, who worked on the appeals for the State of Ohio, praised the two unanimous decisions.
Watkins said he appreciated the statement by Judge John J. Eklund that federal public defenders were making exaggerated, false or untimely claims that only "offer false hope to defendants, distorts the law, misleads judges and wastes the resources of defense counsel, prosecutors and the courts."
The Ohio Supreme Court on April 23, 2026, remanded the question back to the 11th District Court. In August, the 11th District affirmed visiting Judge Patricia Cosgrove's 2023 decision denying Hill's petition for relief, which was raised by the Federal Public Defender's Office, because it was "untimely and successive." The ruling stated there were no new facts that Hill was intellectually disabled, only a new opinion, based upon the old facts.
The 11th District judges stated in their new ruling that an application for reconsideration "is not designed for use in instances where a party simply disagrees with the conclusions reached and the logic used by an appellate court."
In her 2023 decision, Cosgrove found that the trial evidence overwhelmingly supported Hill's conviction for aggravated murder with a death penalty specification. Cosgrove also noted that the issue of intellectual disability "has been examined and re-examined ... in several postconviction petitions and motions for a new trial. The evidence of Hill's behavior before the age of 18 is not new evidence," Cosgrove wrote.
Watkins further believes that the court decisions through the years at the state and federal level affirm that Hill was fairly tried, convicted and sentenced to death for torturing, raping and murdering 12-year-old Raymond Fife in 1985. Watkins added that while a few judges in the minority disagree, there has not been any court finding Hill is intellectually disabled.
Hill was convicted and sentenced to death in 1986 by a three-judge panel on charges of aggravated arson, kidnapping, rape, felonious sexual penetration and aggravated murder with capital specifications arising out of the September 1985 killing of Fife, of Warren. After the crimes, Hill went to the Warren Police Department seeking a reward, giving a statement, blaming others and misleading officers.
The Ohio Supreme Court first rejected Hill's original appeal of his conviction and death sentence in 1992. In 2003, Judge Thomas Curran presided over a hearing relating to Hill's alleged intellectual disability. After an expert for the State and another expert for the Court determined that Hill was not intellectually disabled, Judge Curran rejected Hill's claim, and the Ohio Supreme Court in 2009 declined to accept Hill's appeal. It is that decision that most recently has been upheld.