Stanley Theodore Adams, who went by Ted, was convicted in Trumbull County, Ohio, of three killings committed in the autumn of 1999. In August of that year Roslyn Taylor, a 40-year-old woman from Hubbard, was killed. On the night of October 11, 1999, Esther Cook, 43, and her 12-year-old daughter Ashley Dawn Cook were killed in Warren, a family with whom Adams had lived earlier in the year. A Trumbull County judge entered judgment in the Taylor matter on December 11, 2000, and a jury convicted Adams in the Cook matter in September 2001. He was sentenced to death for each of the Cook murders. The Supreme Court of Ohio affirmed both sentences in November 2004, and he remains under sentence of death. He has denied all three killings.
Adams was 33 at the time of the October 1999 offenses. In 1999 he lived in Champion, a township north of Warren, with his girlfriend and their infant daughter, and he was a self-employed auto mechanic.
Earlier in 1999 he and his girlfriend had lived for several months with the Cook family in Warren. Ashley Cook was the half-sister of Adams's girlfriend. Officials said in 2001 that they did not know whether Taylor had known the Cooks.
At the penalty phase of the 2001 trial, the defense presented evidence of an abusive childhood, and the jury was instructed on mitigating factors.
Roslyn Taylor was 40 and from Hubbard. The Eleventh District Court of Appeals dates the offense to the night of August 4 to 5, 1999.
Adams was indicted on March 16, 2000, in Trumbull County Court of Common Pleas case 00 CR 164. The charges included aggravated murder, rape and a further offense. The jury trial began on October 13, 2000.
The jury found Adams guilty of aggravated murder and rape. The trial court had dismissed the further offense. After the verdict it granted judgment notwithstanding the verdict on the aggravated murder count and entered a conviction for murder under R.C. 2903.02(B) in its place. The rape conviction stood. On December 11, 2000, the court sentenced Adams to 15 years to life for murder and 10 years for rape, to be served consecutively, a combined term of 25 years to life.
Adams appealed the next day. His four assignments of error challenged the denial of a motion for a new trial, which rested on a claim of prosecutorial misconduct, the sufficiency of the evidence, and the weight of the evidence on the rape count. In 2004 the Eleventh District Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction and sentence in an opinion numbered 2004-Ohio-3510, with Judge Christley dissenting. He would have granted a new trial because, in his view, a late disclosure had prejudiced the defense. In 2001, Adams still maintained his innocence of this killing.
Esther Cook was 43 and Ashley was 12. Both lived in Warren, and both were killed on the night of October 11, 1999.
Warren police questioned Adams the next day. On October 20, 1999, after being advised of his rights, he gave audio and video recorded statements to Warren police. Prosecutors later said that several of his statements to police were false. Adams denied any involvement in the deaths. Police told reporters in 2001 that they did not know a motive.
The case was assigned to Judge Peter J. Kontos in the Trumbull County Court of Common Pleas, number 00-CR-700. The indictment charged aggravated murder of Ashley Cook in two counts, one of which was dismissed on the state's motion, and aggravated murder of Esther Cook. Each count carried specifications that made the offense eligible for the death penalty, among them specifications under R.C. 2929.04(A)(5) and (A)(7), and for Ashley (A)(9), which applies to a victim under thirteen. The indictment also charged aggravated burglary, kidnapping and further offenses.
Adams was held without bond in the county jail. In June 2001 the court arranged for three psychologists, one chosen by the defense, one by the prosecutor and one by the court, to assess whether he understood the charges and could assist in his own defense, with a hearing on their reports set for August 13. The trial went ahead.
At a pretrial hearing in November 2000 the defense asked to move the trial out of Trumbull County, arguing that Adams could not receive a fair trial locally. The court said it would move the trial only if an impartial jury could not be seated in the county. Jury selection began on Monday, August 27, 2001, with more than 100 prospective jurors called, and lasted 11 days.
Opening statements were set for September 11, 2001, and were delayed one day because of the terrorist attacks. Dennis Watkins, the Trumbull County prosecutor, led the state's team. Ted Macejko Jr. and Mark Lavelle represented Adams.
The state argued that Adams was responsible and that his statements to police were false. The defense told jurors that Adams was innocent and that they would not be firmly convinced of his guilt.
The jury returned its verdicts on Wednesday, September 26, 2001. It found Adams guilty of two counts of aggravated murder with specifications that the offenses occurred during other crimes, and of aggravated burglary and further offenses. It acquitted him of one count and of the specification attached to it. The sentencing phase followed. On Wednesday, October 3, after about four hours of deliberation, the 12 jurors recommended death for each aggravated murder. Adams asked the jury to spare his life.
Judge Kontos sentenced Adams on October 10, 2001, following the jury's recommendation. He imposed a sentence of death for each aggravated murder and set an execution date of October 11, 2002, which the appeal process postponed. Adams said after sentencing that he would appeal and that he had not received a fair trial. His trial attorneys said other lawyers would handle the appeal.
Because the sentence was death, Adams appealed directly to the Supreme Court of Ohio as of right. His lawyer, Mary Jane Stephens, argued at the August 17, 2004, hearing in Columbus that trial counsel had erred by not seeking to suppress his statement to police, that he had not been fully advised of his rights, and that the jury had not been properly instructed on mitigating factors. Assistant Prosecutor LuWayne Annos answered that the trial was fair, that the statement had been a considered choice because it allowed his version of events to reach the jury without his testifying, and that the mitigation instructions, which covered his childhood, were sound. Justice Terrence O'Donnell remarked that the recorded interview showed Adams to be coherent and to understand his rights.
In an opinion by Chief Justice Thomas Moyer, State v. Adams, 103 Ohio St.3d 508, 2004-Ohio-5845, decided on November 17, 2004, the court rejected 16 of the 17 propositions of law, which included ineffective assistance of counsel, venue, voir dire, competency and the jury instructions. It sustained one. Because the evidence did not show a separate purpose for the kidnapping of Ashley Cook, the court vacated the kidnapping conviction, the kidnapping-based specifications and the separate sentence on that count. After weighing the remaining aggravating circumstances against the mitigating factors, the court affirmed both death sentences and held that each was proportionate. All seven justices concurred.
In spring 2016 the federal appeals court in Cincinnati declined to find that the 2001 trial had been unfair. In January 2017 his remaining appeals were denied, and the Ohio Attorney General told the Trumbull County prosecutor that Adams had exhausted his state and federal reviews. On January 25 Watkins asked the Supreme Court of Ohio to set a date, and the prosecutor's filing noted that Adams had not asked for a stay. On April 21, 2017, the court set his execution for April 16, 2020. He was 50 and was held at a state correctional institution.
The date did not hold. Ohio's governor issued a series of reprieves to death-row inmates. In October 2024 Governor Mike DeWine moved Adams's execution from February 19, 2025, to February 16, 2028. By April 2025 the date had been rescheduled several times, and Adams remains under sentence of death.
Ohio makes aggravated murder eligible for a death sentence only when specific aggravating circumstances are charged and proved, such as a killing committed during an aggravated burglary or a victim under thirteen. In Adams's case the jury recommended the sentence and the trial judge imposed it. Death judgments are appealed directly to the Supreme Court of Ohio, which weighs the aggravating circumstances against the mitigating factors and reviews proportionality independently. The governor can issue a reprieve that moves an execution date, and in Adams's case that has happened since 2017.
Adams has denied involvement in all three killings. In 2001 he maintained his innocence of Taylor's murder, and at trial he denied the Cook murders. The Taylor conviction survived a four-point appeal, with one judge of the appellate panel dissenting. In the Cook matter the Supreme Court of Ohio vacated the kidnapping conviction for want of a separate purpose and left the aggravated murder convictions and death sentences in place.
August 4 to 5, 1999: Roslyn Taylor, 40, of Hubbard, is killed.
October 11, 1999: Esther Cook, 43, and Ashley Cook, 12, are killed in Warren.
October 20, 1999: Adams gives recorded statements to Warren police.
March 16, 2000: Adams is indicted in the Taylor case.
October 13, 2000: the Taylor jury trial begins.
December 11, 2000: judgment in the Taylor case; 15 years to life for murder and 10 years for rape, consecutive.
June 2001: three psychologists are assigned to evaluate Adams's competency.
August 27, 2001: jury selection begins in the Cook case.
September 26, 2001: guilty verdicts.
October 3, 2001: the jury recommends death for each aggravated murder.
October 10, 2001: sentenced to death by Judge Kontos.
2004: the Eleventh District affirms the Taylor conviction and sentence.
November 17, 2004: the Supreme Court of Ohio affirms both death sentences and vacates the kidnapping conviction.
Spring 2016: federal appeals court rejects his trial-fairness claim.
January 2017: state and federal reviews end; the prosecutor asks for an execution date.
April 21, 2017: the Supreme Court of Ohio sets execution for April 16, 2020.
October 2024: the governor moves the execution date to February 16, 2028.