COLUMBUS — A federal judge’s extended moratorium on the carrying out of the death penalty in Ohio prompted the state today to revise its execution schedule, pushing back the planned lethal injection of convicted murderer William Montgomery from February to September in the process.

Montgomery, convicted in the 1986 murders of two Toledo roommates, was scheduled to die using the state’s again revised two-drug method on Feb. 11, but that date is now scheduled to be used to carry out the delayed execution of Ronald Phillips, of Summit County.

The new schedule assumes that U.S. District Judge Gregory Frost won’t again extend his moratorium, which he first put in place in August, as he examines the problems that plagued the execution of Dennis McGuire, 53, of Montgomery County in January.

The moratorium is currently set to expire on Jan. 15.

The state’s proposed response to the problems experienced with that execution is to increase the dosages of the two drugs involved.

The domino effect is also pushing back the scheduled execution of a second condemned inmate from northwest Ohio. Cleveland R. Jackson — one of two men who opened fire on eight people cornered in a Lima apartment kitchen in 2002, killing two girls ages 3 and 17 — is now scheduled to die to die on July 20, 2016. instead of on Nov. 17, 2015.

The McGuire execution marked the first time that any state used a combination of intravenous midazolam, a barbiturate, and hydromorphone, a potent painkiller, for an execution. Witnesses described McGuire as gasping for air and making loud snorting sounds during the 26 minutes after the drugs began to flow.

When Arizona later used the same process, witnesses again described similar reactions.

States have struggled to find an alternative to their preferred execution drug, the sedative pentobarbital, after its European manufacturer objected to its use in executions.

First Published September 5, 2014, 7:54 p.m.