Bulletin: Tyrone Noling: Ohio: Tyrone Noling appeal: The death row inmate has asked the Ohio Supreme Court for access to DNA evidence but faces a serious procedural problem: "Ohio law currently allows people who aren't facing the death penalty the right to an automatic, mandatory appeal when their requests for DNA tests are denied, but capital defendants like Noling don't have same right. They must ask the seven justices on the Ohio Supreme Court to review their cases, something the high court can refuse to do."..."Throughout his 20 years on Ohio's death row, Tyrone Noling has maintained his innocence. Someone else, he says, killed an elderly couple in Atwater Township. Despite his conviction for the 1990 murders of Bearnhardt and Cora Hartig in Portage County, no physical evidence has ever linked him to crime. Noling wants DNA testing of shell casings from the scene that would have come from the perpetrator's gun, as well as ring boxes found opened in a ransacked bedroom drawer. The technology wasn't available to do such testing at the time of his 1996 trial and on Tuesday, Noling's attorney asked the Ohio Supreme Court to help him win access to the powerful forensic tool." Reporter Andrea Simakis; Cleveland Plain-Dealer;

"Throughout his 20 years on Ohio's death row, Tyrone Noling has maintained his innocence. Someone else, he says, killed an elderly couple in Atwater Township. Despite his conviction for the 1990 murders of Bearnhardt and Cora Hartig in Portage County, no physical evidence has ever linked him to crime. Noling wants DNA testing of shell casings from the scene that would have come from the perpetrator's gun, as well as ring boxes found opened in a ransacked bedroom drawer. The technology wasn't available to do such testing at the time of his 1996 trial and on Tuesday, Noling's attorney asked the Ohio Supreme Court to help him win access to the powerful forensic tool. Ohio law currently allows people who aren't facing the death penalty the right to an automatic, mandatory appeal when their requests for DNA tests are denied, but capital defendants like Noling don't have same right. They must ask the seven justices on the Ohio Supreme Court to review their cases, something the high court can refuse to do. That distinction isn't fair and doesn't make sense, said Carrie Wood, an attorney from the Ohio Public Defender's Office who is representing Noling. The discretionary aspect of the law, argued Wood, violates Noling's constitutional right to due process and equal protection. Under the DNA testing statute, "an applicant who is sentenced to probation receives more protection to ensure appropriate access to post-conviction DNA testing than someone who is sentenced to death." The law was put on the books to "potentially identify wrongfully convicted people in the state of Ohio," she said. That's an important function of post-conviction DNA testing, especially for those sentenced to death, she added. Any law or language in the law that makes it harder for people like Noling to have those crucial tests run should be changed, Wood said....The hearing lasted a little under an hour. A decision in the case is likely by the end of the year."
 http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index.ssf/2016/05/tyrone_noling_appeal_ohio_supr.html