Video of the PBS NewsHour interview with U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder is at the link.
"Eric Holder 'greatly troubled' by spate of botched executions," is by Lauren Gambino for the Guardian.
Speaking out for the first time since a botched execution in Oklahoma led to a Justice Department investigation, the US attorney general, Eric Holder, said on Thursday that death-row inmates should have the right to know what drugs the state is using to put them to death.Holder told Gwen Ifill on PBS NewsHour that he is “greatly troubled” by the series of prolonged executions carried out in the US states of Ohio, Oklahoma and most recently Arizona.
"For the state to exercise that greatest of all powers, to end a human life, it seems to me, just on a personal level, that transparency would be a good thing, and to share the information about what chemicals are being used, what drugs are being used,” Holder said during the interview.
NBC News reports, "Attorney General Holder: Condemned Should Know Lethal Drugs," by Pete Williams.
Attorney General Eric Holder said Thursday that condemned prisoners have a right to know the composition and sources of the drugs to be administered in carrying out the death penalty.
His comments, during an interview with Gwen Ifill on the PBS NewsHour, come as the Justice Department is working to complete a study, ordered by President Obama in May, on the growing controversy over lethal injection.
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Attempts to use new combinations and dosages have resulted in botched executions in Ohio, Oklahoma, and Arizona.
State and federal courts have divided on whether those subject to the death penalty are entitled to know which drugs a state intends to use and where they came from.
"Eric Holder calls for more transparency in lethal injections," is by Alex Seitz-Wald for MSNBC.
“For the state to exercise that greatest of all powers – to end a human life – it seems to me, just on a personal level, that transparency would be a good thing and to share the information about what chemicals are being used, what drugs are being used,” he said.
The controversy over lethal injection comes in the aftermath of several botched executions, including a recent high-profile case in Arizona, in which the condemned man stayed alive for almost two hours after the injection.
“There might not be a legal requirement for transparency and just talking about or describing the drugs that are used. But we sometimes have to go beyond that which is legally required to do something that is right,” Holder told Ifill.
Earlier coverage of Arizona's botched execution begins at the link.
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