Sometimes, there are terrible people in this world who go on to do equally terrible things. Ronald Phillips is one of those people. This man raped and murdered his girlfriend’s 3-year-old daughter in 1993. He was caught, arrested, and sentenced to death. He was scheduled to be put to death by lethal injection on Thursday. His execution was to be the first time the US executed a criminal with a new dual injection method. His punishment has been delayed, however, by the Ohio state governor, because of Phillips’ last minute request to donate his organs.

Phillips made the request on Monday to have his organs donated to his mother and sister, after he had plead mercy and “exhausted” all of his other legal options. The man claims that it wasn’t a delay tactic, but an attempt to do good. How, exactly, donating his organs to his family members will quite make up for taking another human life is not very clear.

The request was unexpected and unprecedented, causing a bit of a stir among the prison staff. The staff claimed that the request would be hard, if not impossible, to accommodate, especially since transporting Phillips from the hospital to the prison would be incredibly difficult and pose too many risks, since the transportation would happen to close in time to his scheduled death. In response to the request, the Ohio governor decided to reschedule Phillips’ death day for June 2 of next year.

The governor, a republican representative named John Kasich, said that the added time frame would allow officials to determine whether or not Phillips’ request is actually a possibility or not. The governor went on to say, “Ronald Phillips committed a heinous crime for which he will face the death penalty. I realize this is a bit of uncharted territory for Ohio, but if another life can be saved by his willingness to donate his organs and tissues then we should allow for that to happen.”

[Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.]