"Colorado might struggle to locate drugs if execution planned," is one of two reports by John Ingold in the Denver Post.
Colorado, which hasn't carried out the death penalty in 15 years, is currently incapable of performing an execution.
State law requires executions to be done by lethal injection. Department of Corrections spokeswoman Katherine Sanguinetti said prison officials do not keep supplies of death-penalty drugs on hand unless there is an execution scheduled. Doing so would be a waste of money since unused drugs would need to be replenished as they expire.
But the state could face problems when it goes shopping again for the drugs. One of the three drugs Colorado has historically used in executions — sodium thiopental, also known as sodium pentothal — is no longer being made by its sole American manufacturer. Countries where the drug is made have refused to allow export for use in executions. The European Union last year imposed strict limitations on the export of the drug.
The restrictions have left a number of states that use sodium thiopental in executions scrambling for supplies.
Sanguinetti said it has been "pretty common" for other departments of corrections to call state prison officials asking whether the Colorado DOC has supplies of sodium thiopental available. She said Colorado officials are examining the supply issues.
The article notes that Colorado's last execution was in 1997.
Ingold also writes, "Colorado hearing may signal last chance to halt Nathan Dunlap execution."
Today — 6,671 days after he murdered four people and gravely wounded a fifth at an Aurora Chuck E. Cheese restaurant — Nathan Dunlap will see perhaps the best chance he has left to live.
Dunlap's attorneys will argue today before a three-judge panel of the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver that Dunlap's death sentence should be overturned. They contend that he is mentally ill and that his trial lawyers failed to adequately represent him.
The hearing marks the beginning of the last stages for the final guaranteed appeal of his death-penalty conviction. And it comes with a recognition from Dunlap's defenders that their chances to spare him are growing short.
"Nathan Dunlap is running out of time. This is his last, best chance," said attorney David Lane, who has defended condemned inmates but is not directly involved in Dunlap's appeals. "If he loses here, his odds of being executed skyrocket."
Earlier coverage from Colorado begins at the link.
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