Tyrone Noling has spent three decades on death row for the double murder of an elderly Ohio couple, crimes he maintains he did not commit. On Tuesday, he was given a rare opportunity to argue for a full pardon before the Ohio Parole Board. Noling, 54, of Alliance, presented a growing body of evidence with the backing of the Ohio Innocence Project.
The evidence includes recanted witness testimony, a sheriff and a former juror who have changed their positions on the case, and evidence suggesting that another man who has since been executed may have been the perpetrator. Noling’s case has been featured in documentaries and true-crime podcasts and has attracted support from celebrities, including Kim Kardashian and actors Hilarie Burton and Jeffrey Dean Morgan, all of whom have backed efforts to exonerate him. Following Tuesday’s hearing, the first for an Ohio death row inmate since 2020, the parole board will issue its recommendation to Gov.
Mike DeWine, who has the final say. DeWine, a Republican, called in June for abolishment of the death penalty — saying his stance has changed because he no longer views capital punishment as a deterrent to violent crime. Death row inmates don’t typically land clemency hearings until they have an execution date, which Noling does not, so winning Tuesday’s hearing was a victory.
He seeks release from prison and has said he would not accept a commutation to life without parole for a crime he didn’t commit. Noling was convicted in the April 5, 1990, killings of Bearnhardt and Cora Hartig, both 81, at their Portage County home. The couple’s bodies were discovered on the kitchen floor of their Atwater Township home by a neighbor who noticed their lawn mower had been in front of their home for several days.
Bearnhardt Hartig had been shot three times and his wife five times with a .25-caliber automatic handgun. The house had been ransacked. Authorities said Noling, who had just turned 18 at the time, was part of a group involved in home robberies of elderly couples.
Three others in the group — 14, 15 and 16 at the time — implicated Noling in the slayings of the Hartigs during a burglary but later retracted their statements, saying that police pressured them to name Noling as the shooter. Initial aggravated burglary charges brought against Noling were dropped in 1992, but a grand jury reindicted him in 1995 for the Hartig murders. He was sentenced to death in 1996.
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