I'll be linking to continued news coverage on the FDA lawsuit as well as items from California, Missouri, Nevada, Tennessee, Utah.
ABC News has posted, "States Depend on Unapproved Foreign Drugs for Executions." It's by Ariane De Vogue.
Because of a U.S. shortage of sodium thiopental, which is the first of three drugs used for most lethal-injection executions, some states have resorted to importing the drug from foreign sources.
And:
The drug was developed by Abbott Laboratories in the 1930s and produced until about 2004, when Abbott spun off a new company called Hospira Inc. Hospira announced in January 2010 that it would permanently discontinue production.
As states run out of the drug, they have struggled with how to carry out lethal injections. And opponents of the death penalty want more information about how many states have actually imported it from foreign sources.
And:
The attorneys general of 13 states wrote a letter Jan. 25 to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder asking for his assistance in identifying an approved source of the drug or making supplies held by the federal government available to the states.
The letter states that many jurisdictions will soon be unable to perform executions in cases where appeals have been exhausted and governors have signed a death warrant.
In California, U.S. Federal District Judge Jeremy Fogel is touring the state's new execution chamber today. The Los Angeles Times carries Paul Elias' AP report, "Federal judge who halted executions in California to tour state's new death chamber."
California hasn't executed anyone in more than five years and its death row population has risen, recently reaching 720 inmates — the largest in the country.
U.S. District Court Judge Jeremy Fogel imposed a de facto moratorium on lethal injection executions in California in 2006. His ruling came after he inspected San Quentin Prison's death room and found the converted gas chamber to be so dim, cramped and antiquated that inmates were at risk of suffering cruel and unusual pain.
On Tuesday, the judge returns to the death chamber for the first time since putting the state's executions on hold.
Prison officials, represented by lawyers from the state attorney general's office, want to show the judge the prison's new $900,000 death chamber and argue that the state is ready to immediately resume. They will also argue at the unusual federal court hearing at the prison that they have adopted new regulations and improved staff training to address the judge's other reasons to shelve California's executions.
Attorneys for two death row inmates who are challenging the legality of California's lethal injections argue that the revised system is just as flawed as the execution process that Fogel ordered fixed five years ago.
Fogel is not expected to rule on Tuesday.
Southern California Public Radio distributes Julie Small's KPCC-FM report, "Federal judge who halted California executions tours new San Quentin death chamber."
Fogel found so many deficiencies in the state’s execution system that he issued a moratorium on lethal injections until California fixed some problems, starting with the death chamber’s design.
"It was cramped, the lighting was poor, the delivery mechanism for the drugs was really long and convoluted," says Ty Alper with UC Berkeley Law School's death penalty clinic.
Alper explains the judge’s finding that prison employees were unable to monitor the injection of lethal drugs or the inmates’ response presents a problem because California executes inmates with a succession of three drugs. The first anesthetizes the inmate, and the remaining two paralyze him and stop his heart. Alper says it’s very important that first drug works.
Small is set to be one of the reporters on the Judge's tour and to live tweet from San Quentin.
The San Francisco Appeal has, "Judge To Tour Remodeled San Quentin Death Chamber Today," by Julia Cheever of Bay City News.
Fogel has said he hopes to issue a final ruling on the case this year. He has scheduled a hearing on motions for March 4, and may set additional deadlines or dates at a status conference in his San Jose courtroom on Friday.
California executions have been on hold since Fogel concluded in 2006 that the procedure had numerous flaws, including inadequate training of staff and a poorly lit, overcrowded and badly designed execution chamber.
In Missouri, a challenge to the state's lethal injection procedure is part of the mix of a scheduled execution. Today's Springfield News-Leader carries the AP report, "Nixon denies clemency for death row inmate Link."
Gov. Jay Nixon has denied clemency for a man who is scheduled to be executed at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday for the kidnapping, rape and murder of 11-year-old girl in 1991
And:
Link's attorney, Jennifer Herndon, has two court appeals pending, one before a federal judge, the other before the Missouri Supreme Court. Both question the legality of Missouri's lethal injection protocol.
"He absolutely knows it could go either way," Herndon said. "He's hopeful but realistic."
Link declined an interview request.
His execution in Bonne Terre would be the first in Missouri since May 2009 and just the second since early 2006. Executions in Missouri and elsewhere were on hold for years as the courts decided whether lethal injection could violate the inmate's constitutional guarantee against cruel and unusual punishment. A U.S. Supreme Court ruling in June cleared the way for executions to resume.
But prison officials in most of the 35 states with the death penalty are struggling with a shortage of one of the three drugs used in executions, sodium thiopental, which is an anesthetic that renders the condemned inmate unconscious before the other drugs kill him.
Missouri Department of Corrections spokesman Chris Cline said Missouri has about 40 units of sodium thiopental in stock, and it takes about 10 units for each execution. Missouri's supply of sodium thiopental expires March 1. The state has no further executions scheduled until then.
From Nevada, the Reno Gazette-Journal reports, "Nevada no longer able to acquire key drug used in lethal injections." It's by Martha Bellisle.
A pharmaceutical company's decision to stop manufacturing one of the drugs used to kill death row inmates has left Nevada without a plan should any executions be ordered in the near future.
In response, Nevada Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto joined 11 other attorney generals recently in asking U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder for help in either finding new sources for sodium thiopental or making the federal government's sources available to the states.
And:
The Department of Corrections would need 5 grams of the drug to execute a prisoner, according to its lethal injection protocol, but it "does not maintain a supply of the drug," so none is available, said Kevin Ingram, department spokesman.
"The Nevada Department of Corrections has been working with the office of the attorney general in revising the Execution Manual," Ingram said. "Due to the limited supply of the execution drug used in the past, the drug protocol is being reviewed as well.
"No final decisions have been made by the Office of the Attorney general at this time."
In the letter to Holder, the 12 attorney generals wrote that since lethal injection is the "prescribed method of execution," they need help in the "procurement of one of the prescribed medications used in the lethal injection protocols."
Without a source, "many jurisdictions shortly will be unable to perform executions in cases where appeals have been exhausted and governors have signed death warrants," the letter said.
At present, 82 inmates are housed at Ely State Prison's death row, but the attorney general's office, the department of corrections and the federal public defender's office all agree that no executions are imminent.
The Tennessean reports, "Tennessee has few options for execution drugs," by Brian Haas.
Tennessee has 86 inmates on death row but only enough drugs to execute eight of them.
A nationwide shortage of a key drug used in lethal injections is causing a criminal justice quandary in the 35 states that had relied on sodium thiopental as the first in a three-drug cocktail used in executions. The sole U.S. company that had provided the drug will no longer produce it. Tennessee was able to get a small stock of the drug in October, but the Department of Correction won't say how.
Tennessee, like most states, may have to decide whether to get the drug from a shrinking pool of overseas sources unregulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration or turn to another drug, used to euthanize animals.
Both choices guarantee legal challenges.
Tennessee looks ready to consider the latter. Already Oklahoma has executed three inmates using an anesthetic called pentobarbital, commonly used by veterinarians to put down ailing cats and dogs. Ohio has committed to begin using the alternative drug in executions, and Kentucky is mulling it over.
"Right now, we're looking at all options," Dorinda Carter, spokeswoman for the Tennessee Department of Correction, said when asked about pentobarbital. "That would be something that would likely be discussed. We're taking our time with that to determine what would be best."
She said such a switch would not take long for the state to implement.
"To change the protocol in Tennessee, we wouldn't require legislation or a change in statute," she said. "It would be a departmental review, and then we could put it into play right away."
Today's Deseret News in Utah reports, "Drug shortage forces states to reevaluate the death penalty," by Elizabeth Stuart.
Most states chose the three-drug cocktail because it was a more clinical method to administer death, Fordham University law professor Deborah Denno told the New York Times. Other methods like hanging or the gas chamber, are considered gruesome. The use of the electric chair declined after reports that it made inmates eyes pop out of their sockets. One inmate's head burst into flames.
Denno said there is one method that is quick, effective and doesn't depend on Europe: the firing squad.
"It's the most humane procedure," Denno said. "It's only because of this Wild West notion that people are against it."
Only three inmates have been killed by firing squad since 1976. All were in Utah, which changed its law in 2004 to require the use of lethal injection.
When Ronnie Lee Gardner requested execution by firing squad Utah last year, it attracted national attention . People protested the execution up until a few hours of Gardner's death
And:
After his execution, Gardner continued to move for two minutes, leaving media members to wonder if he would have to be shot again, the Deseret News reported.
Jennifer Dobner, who covered the execution for The Associated Press, said the shooting "was fast. It was almost clinical and very sanitary."
KUTV reporter Fields Mosely told the Deseret News he found it "very violent," however.
"It was exactly what I expected and a little bit worse," he said. "The loudness of the guns shocked me. Even though I grew up with a Winchester 30-30 in my home and shot it many times. … It was violent, and I didn't find it to be clinical at all."
Earlier coverage of lethal injection issues begins at the link.
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