James Finley Bell Jr., 90; Ohio Justice Who Ruled on Real-Life ‘Fugitive’
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James Finley Bell Jr., 90, a former Ohio state Supreme Court justice, died Friday of undisclosed causes in Columbus, Ohio. Bell upheld the murder conviction of Dr. Sam Sheppard on whom “The Fugitive” was based.
In 1956, Bell wrote his opinion in the lengthy litigation of Sheppard, a Cleveland physician whose wife had been slain two years earlier. Sheppard spent 10 years in prison before he was retried and acquitted.
The case was among the most publicized in the nation’s history. It became the subject of several books and the television series and motion picture titled “The Fugitive.”
Bell was elected to the Ohio Supreme Court in 1954 and reelected in 1960, serving until 1962, when he joined a Columbus law firm. He later served as general counsel to General Telephone Co. of Florida and then founded an arbitration firm.
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