A Cuyahoga County trial court provided the “reasons” for denying DNA testing by stating the results would not be “outcome determinative,” a requirement in state law that must be met to order the tests, the Supreme Court of Ohio ruled today.

In a 6-1 decision, the Supreme Court reversed an Eighth District Court of Appeals decision that found a trial judge failed to explain the reasons for denying Daverrick Lash’s request for DNA testing of materials at a 2015 crime scene.

Writing for the Court majority, Justice Patrick F. Fischer explained that R.C. 2953.73(D) requires a trial judge to explain the reasons for denying testing, but the law does not define “reasons” nor indicate how thorough the court’s explanation must be. The DNA testing law does define “outcome determinative,” and a trial court’s order that finds a specific statutory requirement was not met provides the reason to reject the testing, he concluded.

“We hold that an order satisfies R.C. 2953.73’s ‘reasons’ requirement when it provides a statutory reason for the court’s acceptance or rejection of the application,” Justice Fischer wrote.

Chief Justice Sharon L. Kennedy and Justices R. Patrick DeWine, Joseph T. Deters, Daniel R. Hawkins, and Megan E. Shanahan joined Justice Fischer’s decision.

In a dissenting opinion, Justice Jennifer Brunner wrote that the law requires more than just pointing to a requirement. It also demands an explanation of why the DNA testing request did not meet the requirement. She wrote that the majority opinion could lead trial courts to develop forms and check a box to deny the test rather than explain the reasons in a more meaningful way.

Lash Requests DNA Testing
Lash was convicted in 2016 of aggravated murder and other related charges. He was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole in 25 years and a six-year prison term for a firearm specification, meaning he would be eligible for parole in 31 years. Lash unsuccessfully appealed his convictions and sentence.

In 2021, Lash filed an application in Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court requesting DNA testing of items at the crime scene. Lash claimed he was not the person who shot and killed a man at a Cleveland bar in January 2015, and he requested materials that were obtained during the initial investigation to be tested for DNA and uploaded to the FBI’s DNA database.

The trial court rejected the application in a three-sentence order. The judge stated that Lash had not shown that DNA testing would be outcome determinative, and the court found the “results would not be probative.”

Lash appealed to the Eighth District, arguing the trial court abused its discretion by rejecting his DNA testing application. The Eighth District reversed the trial court, writing that the appeals court “has repeatedly held that failure to provide an explanation for rejecting a defendant’s application under R.C. 2953.73(D) is contrary to law.”

The Eighth District remanded the case to the trial court, directing it “to state its analysis for its conclusion.” Because it remanded the case, the Eighth District did not consider the trial court’s determination that the DNA testing would not be outcome determinative.

The Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office appealed the Eighth District’s decision to the Supreme Court.

Supreme Court Analyzed Explanation Requirements
Typically, a trial court is not required to provide written reasoning for its rulings, but the DNA testing law is an exception, Justice Fischer explained. R.C. 2953.73(D) states that when a trial court’s order accepts or rejects a criminal defendant’s request for DNA testing, the order must include “the reasons for acceptance or rejection as applied to the criteria and procedure set forth in sections 2953.71 to 2953.81 of the Revised Code.”

The DNA testing law requires several criteria to be met before a court can order DNA testing, including that if the testing shows that the offender was not the contributor to the DNA evidence to be tested, then the result would be outcome determinative, the opinion noted.

“Outcome determinative” is defined in R.C. 2953.71(L), and means that had the DNA results been presented at the offender’s trial, and considered with all the other available evidence related to the case, there is a strong probability that no reasonable factfinder would have found the offender guilty.

The trial court’s order simply stated Lash had not shown that DNA testing would be outcome determinative, the opinion noted. The Court assessed whether that statement met the requirements of the law to provide a reason for rejecting Lash’s application.

Because “reasons” is not defined in the law, the Court turned to dictionary definitions of “reason” and noted it is often defined as “a statement offered in explanation or justification.”

“It is clear that the trial court order provided a reason: Lash’s application for DNA testing was rejected because the results would not be outcome determinative,” the opinion stated.

The law also requires the trial court to provide its reasons “as applied to the criteria and procedures set forth in sections 2953.71 to 2953.81” of the code. An order that identifies a specific statutory requirement, such as R.C. 2953.71(L), and states that the application fails to meet the requirement, “links the reason for rejecting the application to that requirement,” the opinion stated.

The Court wrote that by stating the result would not be outcome determinative, the trial court necessarily implied that had the DNA evidence Lash sought been presented at his trial, there was not a strong probability that a reasonable factfinder would have found him not guilty of aggravated murder and the other crimes.

The trial court’s order did comply with the requirement to provide a reason for rejection, the Court noted, but the appeals court did not address the merits of Lash’s opposition to rejecting his request. The Court remanded the case to the Eighth District to consider whether the trial court abused its discretion by declining to approve the DNA testing.

More Explanation Required, Dissent Maintained
In her dissent, Justice Brunner noted that R.C. 2953.75(D) requires the trial court to provide the reasons “as applied” to the criteria in the DNA testing laws.

“Why would the General Assembly include an ‘as applied’ clause in its requirements if a simple reason would suffice?” she wrote.

The law does not require a lengthy opinion, but does expect a trial judge to provide an analysis of how the law’s criteria for DNA testing informed the court’s decision. The majority’s decision will likely lead to vague statements about the reasons for rejecting DNA testing, which will hamper appellate courts' ability to order more thorough explanations from trial courts, Justice Brunner concluded.

2025-0218. State v. Lash, Slip Opinion No. 2026-Ohio-2746.

View oral argument video of this case.

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