Ohio's victims' rights issue triumphs by huge margin

Ohio crime victims will have rights enshrined in the state constitution for the first time, as voters overwhelmingly approved State Issue 1 on Tuesday.

Many professional organizations for lawyers objected to the constitutional amendment, but after the Ohio victory, the issue's chief backer said he wants to add the same amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

"I think this is a huge milestone along the way," said Ohio native Henry Nicholas, the California-based sponsor of the issue.

The Ohio issue, also known as Marsy's Law, was winning by a whopping 83 percent with more than 95 percent of Ohio's precincts reporting, unofficial results at the Secretary of State's office showed. It was one of the biggest margins in Ohio history.

The amendment requires that victims of crimes be notified of important hearings in criminal cases and of such actions as prison releases. It also gives alleged victims standing to intervene in criminal cases to try to protect what they see as their interests. And it would seek to protect their privacy.

Nicholas was in Columbus to celebrate the smashing win.

"This will forever be known as the day when Ohio crime victims became something more than another piece of evidence," he said at a victory party at the swank Le Meridien Columbus, The Joseph hotel in the Short North.

Nicholas, the billionaire founder of tech giant Broadcom, is the brother of Marsy Nicholas, who was murdered in 1983 by her ex-boyfriend. Only a week after the slaying, Henry Nicholas and his mother ran into the killer in a grocery store; he had been released from jail unbeknownst to them.

If Marsy's Law had been in effect in California at the time, her family would have known that her attacker was free on bail.

This most recent addition to the Ohio constitution also gives victims of alleged crimes the ability to petition courts to move along criminal cases, which sometimes stall for years. In addition, it gives them the right to contest requests for information that they see as invasive of their privacy.

Supporters of Marsy's Law got a boost from prominent prosecutors such as Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine and Franklin County Prosecutor Ron O'Brien.

But it drew the opposition of their professional group, the Ohio Prosecuting Attorneys Association, as well as the Ohio State Bar Association and the Ohio Association of Criminal Defense Attorneys. Representatives of the groups raised concerns about the amendment, including the difficultly of changing the constitution if some part of the amendment should prove unworkable.

"The language itself makes litigation a foregone conclusion," said Ohio Public Defender Tim Young. "This was a mistake for us to put this in the constitution."

Opposition to Marsy's Law was politically difficult, Young said, because people are understandably sympathetic to victims' rights. He said he's concerned that Marsy's Law could undercut protections for people accused of crimes.

"It makes a false comparison between a victim's rights and a defendant's rights," Young said, explaining that defendants' rights are in the U.S. Constitution.

Many boosters seemed to say Tuesday that they see victims' rights as the same as defendants' rights, even though the latter protections are meant to keep people from being wrongly imprisoned.

Similar measures have passed in California, Illinois, North Dakota, South Dakota and Montana.

mschladen@dispatch.com

@martyschladen