HURON — He’ll sit a state prison cell for another five years before the state parole board considers releasing convicted murderer Dennis Dussell again. The board denied Dussel’s bid, according to state prison officials, and scheduled his next hearing for June 1, 2031.
Dussell, now 71, was first convicted more than 50 years ago in the brutal slaying of 17-year-old Jodi Auble, a popular Huron High School senior, cheerleader, and aspiring nurse.
But, in a decision that shocked the community, the state granted him parole in April 1984 after he served only nine years. It remains one of the most notorious examples of systemic parole failure in Ohio history. Dussell went on a crime spree attacking girls and women until he was finally convicted on violence charges again. In 1991, a Cuyahoga County Common Pleas judge sentenced Dussell to an additional aggregate stack of 63 to 98 years in prison after a jury convicted him on 12 counts, including six counts of rape, kidnapping, and felonious assault.
Dussell has spent his decades in prison filing continuous lawsuits against law enforcement and rehabilitation departments, fighting to scrub sex offender classifications from his file and force another release. He was denied parole in 2021, and is currently incarcerated at the Lorain Correctional Institution.
Right of terror: Read a timeline of Dussell’s violent history
