Man Escapes Execution For Second Time After Pill Overdose

(MYFOX NATIONAL) - An Ohio death row inmate avoided his execution for the second time when he overdosed on pills in his prison cell on Monday reports The Cleveland Leader .

Lawrence Reynolds Jr., 43, was scheduled to face death by lethal injection on Tuesday for the murder of his elderly neighbor in 1994. He was found guilty of strangling her in her home for money to get alcohol.

Reynolds had previously avoided his first date of execution in October 2009 when Ohio Governor Ted Strickland postponed the execution to investigate the lethal injection procedure which Reynolds had been challenging.

Although death row inmates are monitored around the clock for 72 hours before execution, Reynolds was still somehow able to obtain the pills that he overdosed on. A prison spokesperson did not give an explanation as to how Reynolds was able to accomplish this. An investigation is being conducted.

Falls News Press reports that Reynolds was taken back to the Ohio State Penitentiary Tuesday afternoon after recovering at a hospital. He will be kept under strict watch.

State prison spokeswoman Julie Walbum said, “He will no longer be able to have recreation. We are making accommodations to ensure he has attorney access … He won’t be leaving that cell that he’s in right now except under special precautions.”

Reynolds was found unconscious around 11:30 p.m. on Monday night. He was scheduled to have been brought to the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility where the executions are performed.

The Cleveland Leader reports that Gov. Strickland issued a seven-day reprieve and rescheduled Reynolds' execution for March 16.

According to Falls News Press , Strickland used to work as a prison psychologist for the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility.

He said, “Having worked in the prison system, I am hugely aware that the inmate population can be very creative in trying to break the rules and overcome the rules. It’s happened, but I think these kinds of occurrences, in terms of inmates passing medications and saving medications up and doing those kinds of things, is not a terribly rare thing to have happened.”