Hamilton, OH: Killer has taken responsibility for wife and girlfriend's deaths, says brother

Family of Von Clark Davis asks three-judge panel to not impose death penalty for a third time.
By Dave Greber, Staff Writer
Updated 2:02 AM Thursday, September 10, 2009
HAMILTON — Community activist Victor Davis described his older brother as a man who has taken responsibility for the two women he killed, and a man who found religion during subsequent prison sentences.
Von Clark Davis’ family members pleaded Wednesday, Sept. 9, with the three-judge panel in Butler County Common Pleas Court to spare their brother, father and son as they decide whether to return Davis, 62, to Ohio’s Death Row.
“(He) has always attempted to right himself in the face of those who would accept it, and to God,” said Victor Davis, a former director of the Booker T. Washington Community Center. “(He) has always expressed to me how hurt he was that he brought hurt upon two families ... Three families including his own.
“Rather than waste time by simply being incarcerated, (he) has tried to make the most of it, to try and maintain family contacts, social contacts and contacts with those who have played a major part in his life,” Victor Davis said.
Among those contacts is a growing relationship with his daughter Sherry, his daughter with his wife, Ernestine, whom he stabbed to death in 1970.
Sherry Davis, now 41, of Cincinnati said Wednesday the relationship between she and her father has strengthened during the past 15 years, as the two have exchanged letters and telephone calls.
She described her mother’s slaying as “a burden that I carried for a long time” but that she has forgiven her father.
“I had my mother taken away from me,” she said. “I would not like to see my father taken away from me.”
Davis — on parole after spending 10 years in prison for his wife’s death — shot and killed his former girlfriend Suzette Butler, a 24-year-old single mother of Hamilton, two weeks before Christmas 1983.
The judges Wednesday also heard testimony from the defendant’s mother, stepfather and sister.
“I don’t see where it would serve any purpose with a death sentence. Some people say it’s closure, but it’s not closure,” said Davis’ sister, Carol Smith. “I would rather see him where he is still living out his life the best he can behind those bars,” she added, tears streaming down her face. “I just hope the Butlers can understand that we are suffering right along with them.”
Davis has been sentenced to death twice — in 1984 and 1989 — and twice the sentence has been overturned — in 1988 and again in 2007.
Testimony is expected to continue today with Cynthia Mausser, Ohio Parole Board chairwoman.