Harry Mitts was the 52nd person Ohio executed since 1976. In 1994, he shot and killed a neighbor in Garfield Heights for disapproving of an interracial relationship he was engaged in and also fatally wounded a police officer who responded to the disturbance, following a protracted standoff and shootout with cops. The details around Mitts's life prior to the murder are relatively vague; he was born in Ohio June 18, 1952, had several siblings, and graduated Garfield Heights High School in 1970. He studied photojournalism in college and was married twice over the years; he and his second wife had a daughter named Melanie but by the time of the murder they had separated and she had custody of their child and remarried to a police officer.On August 14, 1994, Mitts had an argument with his ex-wife that culminated in him going on a six hour long shooting spree in his neighborhood. He apparently became infuriated that his neighbor Tracey Griffin, a white female, was dating an African-American man, 28 year old John Bryant. A little before that, a man named Timothy Rhone was helping his sister and brother-in-law Jeff Walters move into their apartment, in the same complex that Mitts resided in. Rhone saw Mitts carrying a gun tucked in the small of his back. A short while later, Mitts donned target shooting ear muffs and confronted Rhone in the hallway. He had a "black and huge" laser sighted gun and told Rhone he'd better leave or die. Rhone asked him what he meant by that and he replied "I'm not joking. Get out now." Rhone fled and asked his mother and sister to call the cops because a man with a gun was threatening to shoot people.
A bit later, Tracey Griffin and John Bryant returned to the apartment from a shopping trip and saw Mitts approach with a gun and goggles on. The two were casually acquainted because their daughters had been sometimes playmates. Mitts used the laser sight to draw a bead on Bryant's chest and said "Niggers, niggers, I'm just sick and tired of niggers!" He fired into Bryant's chest. He turned and walked off. Walters and Timothy Rhone's brother Terry came out to help Bryant. Mitts pointed the gun and ordered them to leave him be. They ignored Mitts and carried Bryant into their apartment.At 8:15 P.M., Officer John Cermak arrived and Mitts was seen to reload his gun. He got off a couple shots at Cermak, forcing him to drive his patrol car onto a lawn and take cover. Two other officers, Lt. John Kaiser and Sgt. Dennis Glivar, arrived. Mitts retreated to his apartment. The officers split up and went looking for the suspect while Kaiser and Glivar found Griffin, Bryant, and the Rhones. They called an ambulance and went down to the first floor. As they approached Mitts's apartment, he threw the door open and opened fire, a gun in each hand. Glivar was hit multiple times and forced to drop his shotgun, and Kaiser was hit in the chest and right hand. Kaiser moved his service pistol to his left hand and fired a couple of times, forcing Mitts to retreat. Kaiser retreated to the Rhones' apartment and called for backup and a S.W.A.T. team.
The wounded Kaiser continued trying to get Mitts to surrender, but he wasn't having it. "The only way we're going to end this is if you kill me. You have to come down, you have to do your job, and you have to kill me," he exclaimed. Mitts overheard Kaiser calling for a S.W.A.T. team and said "Go ahead, bring the S.W.A.T. team in. I have thousands of rounds of ammunition. I'll kill your whole S.W.A.T. team. I'll kill your whole police department." He also added "I'm gonna come up and kill that nigger-loving bitch that's upstairs with you." Mitts further said he'd been drinking and upset that the Grand Rivers police chief stole his wife. Eventually Cermak dragged Glivar's body from the hallway and he and others used a ladder to rescue the Rhones and Kaiser from the upstairs apartment.During the standoff, Mitts called his ex-wife Janice Salerno and her husband, Grand River police chief Jon Salenero. Salerno at first didn't take Mitts seriously when he said "It's all over with now. I shot a couple of cops and I killed a fucking nigger." Salerno, who believed he was drunk, tried to convince him to surrender, but he wouldn't do it. Mitts said he wanted to kill Salerno and his ex-wife, but only didn't because his daughter lived with the Salernos.At 8:40 PM, Maple Heights PD officer John Mackey responded to the call for police assistance from Garfield Heights. After assisting Cermak rescue Kaiser and the Rhones, he, Sgt. Robert Sackett, and others took tactical positions in the hallway outside Mitts's apartment. Taking over from Kaiser as a negotiator, Mackey talked with Mitts for over 30 minutes. He still would not give himself up and continued to fire stray shots. Using Glivar's shotgun, Mitts shot twice into a mailbox across the hall and he also emptied ten pistol shots into the mailbox. Mitts seemed calm and collected the whole time and never raised his voice in anger.
At 9:30 PM, Mitts detected Mackey's position in the upstairs apartment from hearing his voice and fired up the stairway and through a wall, hitting Mackey's leg with a bullet fragment. Other officers returned fire and rescued Mackey. At 1:00 AM, the S.W.A.T. team fired tear gas into Mitts's apartment and about one hour later subdued him. Mitts, who was wounded during the standoff, was taken by ambulance to a local hospital, then taken by helicopter to a trauma center at Cleveland's MetroHealth Medical Center. A blood sample found him to have a blood alcohol level of .21 grams per 100 milliliters.Inside Mitts's apartment was a range of firearms and shooting gear, including earmuffs, goggles, a .44 revolver, a 9mm automatic pistol, a .22 pistol, a laser gun sight, thousands of rounds of ammo in boxes, and two mostly empty liquor bottles. It was later learned that Mitts spent the previous afternoon target shooting at the Stonewall Range firing range. Bryant's body was found upstairs in apartment 204.Autopsy of Bryant found that he died of internal bleeding from a single gunshot wound to the chest which punctured both lungs and tore his aorta. He had died about 30 minutes after being shot. Autopsy of Glivar found that he'd been shot five times in the torso, hitting his right lung, heart, liver, kidney, stomach, and small intestine, and he was also shot in the left shoulder and forearm. He had succumbed within about 5-6 minutes from these multiple injuries.
Mitts was charged with two counts of aggravated murder and two counts of attempted murder, including the murder of an on-duty police officer. After being booked into the county jail, he found that he was not popular there; black prisoners hated him for killing a black man, the jail staff hated him for killing a cop. He did not contest the charges but as a defense claimed he was drunk and could not have deliberately planned to kill anyone. However, on November 3, he was found guilty on all charges and sentenced to death. Mitts would appeal his conviction for the next two decades. The first appeal was rejected by the state supreme court in 1998. An Ohio court of appeals rejected another appeal two years later and again in 2002. Another appeal to a US district judge three years later was also rejected.In 2010 the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals ordered his death sentence overturned when they found that the jurors at his original trial were given improper instructions on the grounds that they had been told to consider the death penalty first and before the option of life imprisonment was presented. The state contested that ruling and appealed it to the Supreme Court, which upheld Mitts's death sentence on the grounds that his constitutional rights weren't violated and that they'd ruled on a similar case earlier.Although Mitts insisted the murder of Bryant wasn't racially motivated, the state parole board rejected that claim and his execution by lethal injection was carried out September 25, 2013.
>>18002068>>18002067The hero /pol/ deserved.
>>18002067Why were boomers like this?
>>18002068>Mitts used the laser sight to draw a bead on Bryant's chest and said "Niggers, niggers, I'm just sick and tired of niggers!" He fired into Bryant's chest. He turned and walked/pol/, I...
