Opinions in brief

Quick summaries of five decisions released by the Supreme Court on December 7 and 8.

In State v. Sowell, the Court affirmed the death penalty for convicted serial killer Anthony Sowell.

In State ex rel Ohio Presbyterian Retirement Services v. Industrial Commission, the Court held that the Industrial Commission cannot award compensation for permanent partial disability to a worker who has already been awarded permanent total disability for the same claim.

In In re Grand Jury Proceeding of John Doe, the Court held that an order denying a motion to quash a subpoena requiring a witness to testify before or produce documents to a grand jury was immediately appealable. This case, like Burnham v. Cleveland Clinic, precipitated another concurrence from Justice Kennedy (joined again by Justice French) calling for Smith v. Chen to be overruled.

In James v. State, the Court held that James, who was initially convicted on drug and weapons charges, but later released when granted a writ of habeas corpus by the federal court, and who was not retried, did not fit within R.C. 2743.48(A)'s definition of a "wrongfully imprisoned individual."

In Disciplinary Counsel v. Tamburrino, the Court disciplined former judicial candidate Ronnie Tamburrino for making false statements about his opponent in the 2014 election for a seat on the Eleventh District Court of Appeals. Justices Kennedy and French dissented from the discipline, arguing that "When, as here, one candidate’s statement about his or her opponent involves core political speech susceptible to a truthful interpretation, the better course is to let the candidates themselves publicly debate the truthfulness of the statement, rather than attempting to act as a truth-declaring forum and penalizing candidates for the exercise of their free-speech rights.