State v. Downs

Appellant presents five propositions of law.

I

In his first proposition of law, the defendant attacks the constitutionality of Ohio’s capital sentencing procedure, as follows:

“Section 2929.04(B) of the Ohio Revised Code, requiring a defendant convicted of aggravated murder to prove certain mitigating, circumstances by a preponderance of the evidence in order to be sentenced to life imprisonment, rather than to death, violates the due process requirement of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution, and Article one, Section sixteen of the Ohio Constitution; the prosecution must…