COLUMBUS — Condemned killer John W. Byrd Jr. was almost executed twice pursuant to a death sentence he swears he does not deserve. On Monday, he will get an unprecedented chance to explain why.

        The death row inmate is scheduled to take the stand in a Dayton federal courtroom to talk about what happened the night Colerain Township convenience store clerk Monte Tewksbury was robbed and stabbed to death.

Byrd

        Magistrate Michael R. Merz also is expected to hear from John Eastle Brewer, an accomplice to the April 17, 1983, robbery and murder who claims he was the man who plunged the knife in Mr. Tewksbury's side. Mr. Brewer is serving a life prison term.

        These two men lead off five days of dramatic and controversial testimony intended to explore Mr. Byrd's last-ditch appeal that his trial was unfair and that he is “actually innocent” of the charges.

        While the state and Hamilton County prosecutors prepare to argue Mr. Byrd is as guilty now as he was in 1983, they continue to insist the new hearings are illegal.

        To call this case unusual would be an understatement.

        A bitterly divided group of judges at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit stopped Mr. Byrd's Sept. 12 execution, just two days before it was to take place.

        A majority of the court's nine active judges later ordered the hearings to weigh Mr. Brewer's confessions and explore other issues that they decided haven't been fully considered by state courts.

        Among those issues is a claim that a jailhouse informant lied on the stand to help prosecutors convict Mr. Byrd.

        Also undealt with is a recently revealed statement from a man named Robert Pottinger who said Mr. Byrd was passed out in the get-away truck when a second robbery occurred. Prosecutors tried to place Mr. Byrd at that robbery to imply he was the man who carried the knife into a second store.

        Mr. Pottinger is scheduled to testify Tuesday. A group of former Hamilton County jailhouse inmates who swear informant Ronald Armstead made up his story also will testify.

        Even the attorneys will take the stand. Ohio Public Defender David Bodiker is scheduled to speak Wednesday and former Hamilton County prosecutor Daniel Breyer testifies Thursday.

        As each new person takes the stand, a fundamental question of whether these hearings are actually legal remains unanswered.

        In a rare public display of outrage, at least four 6th Circuit judges blasted the decision as lawless. They said no federal law grants the court majority the right to stop the execution and reopen the case.

        Ohio Attorney General Betty Montgomery echoes those arguments in an appeal that asks the U.S. Supreme Court to void the hearings. It's not clear the high court will step in before the proceedings conclude Friday.

        State courts dismissed Mr. Brewer's confessions as unbelievable and too late. The state public defender's office took Mr. Brewer's first confession in 1989 but never used it until January, when Mr. Byrd had exhausted all of his guaranteed appeals.

        The state first attempted to execute Mr. Byrd in 1994. The U.S. Supreme Court halted the execution hours before it was to take place, ruling that he was unfairly denied a federal appeal.

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