The StandDown Texas Project

Additional Coverage of the Texas LI Ruling

"Judge orders Texas to release information on execution drugs," is by Mike Ward for the Houston Chronicle.

Thursday's courtroom drama was the latest development in an increasing fight by states nationwide to keep details from the public about execution drugs, including suppliers' names, amounts on hand, dosages and even the amount of taxpayer money being spent on them.

Several states have passed laws keeping secret the information that just a few years ago was routinely made public.

One reason is an aggressive campaign by death penalty opponents to cut off the drug supplies, first by successfully lobbying U.S. pharmaceutical firms to stop making the drugs most commonly used or to move the manufacturing overseas. In the past two years, European countries that oppose the death penalty have blocked shipments of drugs to be used in U.S. death chambers.

Texas, which has the busiest death chamber in the United States, has been at the forefront of the continuing jockeying for suppliers. Like several other states, it was forced to switch from a three-drug combination to a single overdose of pentobarbital to carry out executions.

The updated AP report is, "Texas Must Tell Attorneys Execution Drug Supplier," by Michael Graczyk and Paul J. Weber, via ABC News.

A judge ordered Texas prison officials Thursday to disclose the supplier of a new batch of lethal injection drugs to attorneys for two inmates set to be executed next month, but she stopped short of revealing the identity of the manufacturer to the public.

The ruling by state District Judge Suzanne Covington came after the Texas Department of Criminal Justice argued that threats against execution suppliers are escalating. The agency recently obtained a threat assessment from law enforcement officers, and pictures on the Internet suggest physical harm against pharmacists making the drugs, Assistant Attorney General Nicole Bunker-Henderson said.

State prison officials have lost previous attempts to keep information about its execution drug supplier confidential.

"TDCJ Will Appeal Judge's Ruling on Execution Drugs," by Aamena Ahmed for the Texas Tribune.

Currently, similar lawsuits are pending in other death penalty states where prison officials are seeking to keep the source of execution drugs confidential.

Because Texas operates the nation's busiest execution chamber in Huntsville, with 511 executions since 1983, including three so far this year, the case is being watched closely nationwide.

The Guardian posts, "Texas prison officials ordered to reveal source of lethal injection drugs," by Tom Dart in Houston.

The ruling in a district court in Austin on Thursday came after attorneys for the men filed a lawsuit against the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) arguing that knowing the provenance of the drugs and their purity was vital to determining whether the inmates might be subjected to unconstitutional levels of pain during their executions.

The outcome follows a decision on Wednesday in Oklahoma in which a judge found that a state law keeping the source of lethal injection drugs a secret to be unconstitutional and in violation of inmates' right to due process.

“The ruling signals, as other courts have done recently, that it is unacceptable to keep prisoners or the public in the dark regarding how executions are carried out – including the source of the drugs,” Maurie Levin, a lawyer for the Texas pair, Tommy Sells and Ramiro Hernandez, said in a statement.

The judge issued a protective order meaning that Texas officials must provide details to the inmates’ lawyers but the information will not be made available to the public, at least for the time being.

Additional coverage includes:

"Texas judge orders prisons to name lethal injection drug supplier," by Jon Herskovitz for Reuters.

"Judge Orders Texas to Reveal Lethal Injection Connection," by Tracy Connor at NBC News.

"Texas Must Come Clean on Death Drugs," by David Lee for Courthouse News Service.

"Judges: Texas and Oklahoma Must Lift Veil of Secrecy on Execution Drug Suppliers," by Steven Hsieh at the Nation.

Earlier coverage of the Texas lethal injection ruling begins at the link.

Texas Executes

Texas carried out its fourth execution of 2014, tonight in Huntsville.  It was the 512th post-Furman Texas execution since 1982, and the 273rd execution under the administration of Gov. Rick Perry. Texas is responsible for more than 37% of the nation's post-Furman executions.

"Texas man put to death for delivery woman slaying," is Michael Graczyk's AP report, via the Austin American-Statesman.

Anthony Doyle, 29, was given a lethal injection for the 2003 death of Hyun Mi Cho, who was beaten with a baseball bat, then robbed of her car, cellphone and credit cards. Evidence showed Doyle ordered the doughnuts and breakfast tacos that the 37-year-old Cho delivered. He shared the food with friends after stuffing the woman's body in a neighbor's trash can in an alley behind the home in Rowlett, a suburb just east of Dallas.

Doyle shook his head and said nothing inside the death chamber in Huntsville when a warden asked if he had a statement to make. The prisoner's eyes closed as the sedative pentobarbital was injected. He took a few breaths, then began to snore quietly. Soon, he stopped moving.

He was pronounced dead 25 minutes later, at 6:49 p.m.

And:

About two hours before Doyle was put to death, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a last-day appeal to block his execution. Doyle's attorney had called for his execution to be delayed, but not over the drug issue. The lawyer said Doyle deserved a new punishment hearing because jurors at his 2004 capital murder trial were given unknowingly false evidence about Doyle's inability to be rehabilitated while he was confined at a juvenile detention facility for his delinquent behavior years before Cho's slaying.

There have been 14 executions in American death penalty states this year; a total of 1,373 post-Furman execution since 1977.  

According to TDCJ, Texas state district courts have set five additional execution dates.

Breaking News in Texas LI Challenge

"Texas must tell attorneys execution drug supplier," is the breaking news AP report by Michael Graczyk and Paul J. Weber, via the Austin American-Statesman.  It's also available from the Houston Chronicle.

A state judge ordered the Texas prison agency Thursday to disclose its supplier of a new batch of execution drugs to attorneys for two inmates set to be put to death.

The ruling Thursday in Austin came one day after attorneys for two death row inmates filed a lawsuit against the Texas Department of Criminal Justice seeking the information. It was not immediately clear if the agency would comply or appeal the ruling.

The prison agency lost its previous supplier last year after the compound pharmacy's name was made public and it received threats. Prison officials contend the identity of the new drug source should be withheld to protect the new supplier.

The lawsuit against the state agency contends the prisoners cannot evaluate the risk that could result in them being subjected to unconstitutionally cruel pain.

And:

The state attorney general's office previously has said the information should be public and is waiting for arguments from the agency on why the policy should be changed.

Maurie Levin, the attorney for the two men, has issued a "Statement from Attorney for Petitioners in Response to Today’s Ruling by Austin District Court that TDCJ Must Disclose to Attorneys the Source of Its Execution Drugs."  Here's the full text:

“Today’s ruling ensures that the Texas Department of Criminal Justice will do what the Texas Attorney General has repeatedly made clear that they must do – disclose the source of execution drugs, specifically compounded pentobarbital, to be used in upcoming executions.  The ruling signals - as other courts have done recently - that it is unacceptable to keep prisoners or the public in the dark regarding how executions are carried out - including the source of the drugs.

‘The information will be disclosed under protective order, so that those facing imminent execution can have the information necessary to evaluate whether Texas' execution process will violate their right to be free of cruel and unusual punishment.  While we believe TDCJ is ultimately accountable to the people of Texas, and that transparency in this process is essential, the assessment of the broader public's right to know will be made at a later date.

‘Secrecy surrounding the lethal injection process is, as today’s ruling shows, unacceptable. The condemned must have clear information about the drugs to be used, so that the courts can make an accurate assessment of the viability and constitutionality of any impending execution. In particular, pentobarbital for lethal injections now comes from compounding pharmacies, which are coming under increased scrutiny precisely because they are not adequately regulated. Indeed, executions carried out with compounded drugs in other states have led in some instances to prolonged and seemingly torturous executions.”

Earlier coverage of the Texas lethal injection challenge begins at the link.

Additional Coverage of the Oklahoma LI Ruling

"Oklahoma Told It Can’t Shield Suppliers of Execution Drugs," is by Erik Eckholm for the New York Times.

An Oklahoma judge ruled on Wednesday that the state could not keep secret the identities of the suppliers of lethal-injection drugs, raising doubts about the executions of two prisoners next month and fueling a growing legal battle in several states over secrecy in methods of execution.

The state argued that a supplier-secrecy law, passed in 2011, was necessary because of a shortage of execution drugs and threats against companies that supply them. But lawyers for the two prisoners, Clayton Lockett and Charles Warner, countered that without knowing the source of the drugs, courts could not determine whether the execution protocol satisfied the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment, and prisoners were denied the right to know, and potentially question, how they would be put to death.

Judge Patricia Parrish, of the Oklahoma County District Court, declared the secrecy statute to be an unconstitutional violation of due process in an oral decision from the bench.

The updated AP report is, "Oklahoma Judge Strikes Execution Law Over Privacy," by Bailey Elise McBride, via ABC News.

"Judge Parrish's decision is a major outcome that should have a reverberating impact on other states that are facing similar kinds of transparency issues," said Deborah W. Denno, a professor of law at Fordham University.

And:

Jen Moreno, a staff attorney at U.C. Berkeley School of Law's Death Penalty Clinic, said Parrish's decision "shows there is a growing concern by courts that states are keeping information secret."

"Ultimately, I think her decision is obviously a good step toward bringing transparency and accountability to what's happening in Oklahoma," she said. "I think turning to the secrecy and turning to untested or risky compounded drugs and risky procedures is a trend we've seen in a lot of states and a push to keep that information secret."

The supply of drugs used in lethal injections has dried up in recent years as European manufacturers object to their use in executions and U.S. companies fear protests or boycotts.

"Oklahoma law allowing execution drug secrecy ruled unconstitutional," by Katie Fretland, reporting in Oklahoma City for the Guardian.

An Oklahoma judge ruled Wednesday that a state law that makes the source of execution drugs a secret is unconstitutional.

Oklahoma county district court judge Patricia Parrish said the law violates death row inmates' right to access to the courts in order to argue against their own executions. The statute denies even the judge information about execution drugs, she said.

"I do not think this is even a close call," Parrish said.

Oklahoma assistant attorney general John Hadden said the state will appeal Parrish's decision to the Oklahoma supreme court.

And:

The 2011 law the judge found to be unconstitutional states: “The identity of all persons who participate in or administer the execution process and persons who supply the drugs, medical supplies or medical equipment for the execution shall be confidential and shall not be subject to discovery in any civil or criminal proceedings."

"Oklahoma judge finds aspect of state execution law unconstitutional," by Graham Lee Brewer for teh Oklahoman.

Moments after the ruling, lawyers for the two inmates acknowledged an appeal to the state Supreme Court by the state was likely but said they were happy with Parrish’s decision.

“This case was all about transparency, having access to information,” said Susanna Gattoni, one of their attorneys. “And, so we’re very, very pleased that the district court ruled that people do have the right to know what the government’s doing. That’s essentially what she said today. They have to give us the information, and now they will.”

It is unclear who exactly the state must reveal its lethal drug source to or what time frame it has to do so.

Lockett and Warner’s executions are scheduled for April 22 and 29, respectively, said state Corrections Department spokesman Jerry Massie. Massie declined to comment further on any aspect of the executions, including whether or not the state has the drugs necessary to carry them out.

“We will confer with the attorney general’s office once we have received the written order to determine our legal course of action,” Massie said.

"Judge strikes down Oklahoma execution law," by Michael Muskal for the Los Angeles Times.

“The secrecy statute is unconstitutional because it denies both the inmate and the court access to the information,” Chelsea Adkins, bailiff for Parrish, told the Los Angeles Times, describing the jurist’s ruling on the case. The ruling will likely be appealed.

Even though the ruling was made by a state judge, it could have an effect beyond Oklahoma’s borders, Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, a Washington-based nonprofit group that tracks death penalty issues, told The Times.

“A ruling like this can set a precedent on issues like this.”

Parrish issued her ruling in response to a request from inmates Clayton Lockett and Charles Warner, who are scheduled to be executed on April 22 and April 29, respectively. Both have requests to stay their executions pending in other courts.

Additional coverage includes:

"Oklahoma Judge Says Execution Drug Secrecy Is Unconstitutional," by Tracy Connor for NBC News.

"Okla. judge rules execution law unconstitutional," by Doug Stanglin at USA TODAY.

"Oklahoma Judge Says State Can’t Keep Execution Drugs Secret," by Josh Sanburn for Time.

ABA Journal posts, "Judge strikes Oklahoma lethal injection law because source of drugs is secret," by Martha Neil.

"Judge Blocks Oklahoma From Using Secret, Unverified Drug In Executions," by Nicole Flatow at Think Progress.

Earlier coverage of the Oklahoma court ruling begins at the link.

Texas Execution Scheduled for Thursday

Texas is set to carry out its fourth execution of 2014, Thursday night in Huntsville.  It would be the 512th post-Furman Texas execution since 1982, and the 273rd execution under the administration of Gov. Rick Perry. Texas is responsible for more than 37% of the nation's post-Furman executions.

"Executing Youthful Offenders: The Doyle Case," is by Jordan Smith for the Austin Chronicle.

According to court records, Anthony Dewayne Doyle did not have a happy home life. His parents often fought; the uncles who hung around the family's home in Rowlett were heavy drinkers who roughed up their girlfriends. Doyle's one companion was his grandfather, with whom he shared a bedroom as a child. Indeed, Doyle was 11 and sleeping in the same bed with his grandfather the night the elder man passed away. Doyle's behavior changed after that, family testified at Doyle's 2003 trial, but he never received counseling. After that he found himself in trouble frequently, with several misdemeanor charges that eventually landed him in a Texas Youth Com­mis­sion boot camp program alongside juvenile felons.

Two years after he was released from that program, and just three months after his 18th birthday, Doyle called Chaha Donuts, placed an order for delivery to his mother's home, and then beat to death the delivery driver, Hyun Cho, when she refused to give Doyle any money. He dumped the body in a neighbor's trash can and tried to clean the blood before taking off in Cho's car, according to court records.

There is no doubt that Doyle committed the crime – he left behind plenty of physical evidence and made a full, handwritten 10-page confession to police. What remains in doubt, according to court filings, is whether Doyle's culpability is mitigated by immaturity, "organic" brain damage, and other "serious emotional and psychological mental impairments," reads an appeal filed late last year with the U.S. Supreme Court by Doyle's attorney Lydia Brandt. At specific issue is whether Doyle, even though already 18 at the time of the brutal crime, should instead be treated as a juvenile under the law – a protection that would eliminate the possibility of a death penalty.

There have been 13 executions in American death penalty states this year; a total of 1,372 post-Furman execution since 1977. 

Houston's KPFT-FM will host Execution Watch on the web and its HD radio broadcast signal beginning at 6:00 p.m. (CDT), this evening.

According to TDCJ, Texas state district courts have set five additional execution dates.

Texas Lawsuit Seeks New LI Drug Info

Today's Houston Chronicle reports, "2 condemned killers sue for execution-drug details," by Mike Ward.  The former Austin American-Statesman reporter has covered lethal injection issues for years.  He recently moved to the Hearst Newspapers Capitol Bureau.

Two condemned killers, including a onetime drifter who once claimed he killed 70 people in a cross-country crime spree spanning 19 years, sued state officials on Wednesday to force them to disclose details about the execution drugs that will be used to end their lives.

In a lawsuit filed in Travis County state court, Tommy Lynn Sells, 49, and Ramiro Hernandez Llanes, 44, alleged that the Texas Department of Criminal Justice is illegally refusing to provide their attorneys with information about the powerful barbiturate pento­barbital that will be used to execute them, despite earlier court orders and attorney general opinions requiring that information be made public.

The suit comes just days after Texas prison officials announced that they had obtained an additional supply of the state's execution drug, but would not disclose anything about the suppliers, manufacturers and other details about the drugs as they have in the past.

The case comes at a time when similar suits are pending in other states, as prison officials across the country are moving to keep the source of their execution drugs confidential. In recent years, several manufacturers have stopped making the drugs or prohibited their use in executions after their names were disclosed, and suppliers have quit shipping to Texas and other states for the same reason.

"Lawsuit seeks to ID source of Texas execution drug," is Michael Graczyk's AP report, via the Austin American-Statesman.

Attorneys for two Texas inmates facing execution next month with a new batch of pentobarbital obtained by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice filed a lawsuit Wednesday demanding the prison agency disclose the identity of the new supplier.

The petition filed in state court in Austin also sought an emergency order requiring state authorities to identify when the drug was obtained and any results of tests on its potency and purity.

The attorneys represent convicted killers Tommy Lynn Sells, set to die April 3, and Ramiro Hernandez, scheduled for April 9.

The current supply of pentobarbital used for lethal injections in Texas expires April 1. Prison officials said last week they have a new supply but cited security reasons for declining to name the provider.

The state attorney general’s office previously has said the information should be public and is waiting for arguments from the agency on why the policy should be changed.

Earlier coverage of Texas lethal injection issues begins at the link.

Oklahoma Judge Tosses State Execution Law - Updated

That's the title of an Associated Press breaking news report filed by Bailey Elise McBride, via the Oklahoman.  It's also available from the Tulsa World.

An Oklahoma judge ruled the state's execution law unconstitutional Wednesday because its privacy provision is so strict that it that prevents inmates from finding out the source of drugs used in executions, even through the courts.

After an Ohio inmate gasped while dying and an Oklahoma prisoner complained that he felt his body burning, inmates Clayton Lockett and Charles Warner had wanted to know who was making the drugs that would kill them next month and whether the material was pure.

However, under Oklahoma law, no one is allowed to disclose the source of those drugs — even if an inmate sues and wants the information as part of the discovery process. Oklahoma County District Judge Patricia Parrish said that prevents the inmates from exercising their rights under the Constitution.

"I think that the secrecy statute is a violation of due process because access to the courts has been denied," Parrish ruled.

Attorneys for Charles Warner and Clayton Lockett in Response to State District Court Ruling Finding Oklahoma's Secrecy Statute Unconstitutional have issued the following statement:

“Today, Judge Patricia Parrish in Oklahoma City ruled that Oklahoma's secrecy statute is unconstitutional because it denies prisoners facing execution access to the courts. This decision is an important step towards greater transparency and accountability in Oklahoma's execution system.

‘We hope that no execution will go forward until the state reveals full information about the source of its execution drugs, particularly in light of the new, controversial protocol it unveiled last week, which lists five different methods, four of which appear to require the use of non-FDA approved compounded medicines and two of which are highly experimental.

‘Particularly in light of that new protocol, we are considering all available legal remedies, including an appeal to the Oklahoma Supreme Court of the claims, denied in today's ruling, that the protocol need not comply with the public notice and hearing requirements of the Administrative Procedures Act, and that the legislature delegated too much discretion to the Department of Corrections to determine execution procedures.”

The statement was made by Madeline Cohen, Assistant Federal Public Defender.

Reuters posts, "Oklahoma's lethal injection protocol unconstitutional: judge," by Heide Brandes.

County district court judge Patricia Parrish ruled that the state violated due process protections in the U.S. Constitution by not providing the name of the drug supplier, the combination of chemicals and the dosages used in implementing the death penalty.

The judgment comes as more states have trouble obtaining the lethal chemicals used in executions because of restrictions placed on their sale by drugmakers. It also strengthens the arguments made by lawyers that untested chemicals may could cause undo suffering.

The Oklahoma case was brought by lawyers for two inmates, Clayton Lockett and Charles Warner, who were due to be executed this month but their sentences were pushed back until April because the state said it could not obtain the drugs it has used for years in its lethal cocktail.

Earlier coverage of Oklahoma lethal injection issues begins at the link.

Missouri Executes Jeffrey Ferguson

"Missouri man executed for raping, killing teen in 1989," is AP coverage, via the Springfield News-Leader.

Strapped to a hospital gurney, Ferguson was animated in the moments before his midnight execution at the state prison in Bonne Terre. To ease the tension, he made funny faces and mouthed words to relatives, who included his two daughters, sitting in the observation room.

As the lethal drug was administered, he took a few deep breaths before becoming still, and his daughters cried as he closed his eyes. The 59-year-old was pronounced dead at 12:11 a.m.

"I'm sorry to have to be the cause that brings you all into this dark business of execution," Ferguson said in his final statement. "I pray for the victim's family to have peace in their hearts one day and lose the anger, hate and need for revenge that has driven them."

Reuters posts, "Missouri executes killer of teenage girl," by Carey Gillam.

Ferguson's execution comes at a time when Missouri, and several U.S. states, are under fire for turning to lightly regulated compounding pharmacies for their lethal injection drugs.

Major pharmaceutical companies have stopped allowing sales of their drugs for executions, leaving U.S. states scrambling to come up with alternatives.

There have been 13 executions in American death penalty states this year; a total of 1,372 post-Furman execution since 1977.  It was Missouri's third execution of 2014.

Earlier coverage from Missouri begins at the link.

Missouri Prepares to Execute

"Man facing execution Wednesday remains upbeat, lawyer says," is AP report by Jim Salter, via the Springfield News-Leader.

Missouri death row inmate Jeffrey Ferguson is holding out hope that his life will be spared, but he is ready to accept his fate either way, his attorney said Monday.

Ferguson, 59, is scheduled to die by injection at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday for raping and killing a 17-year-old girl in 1989. Prosecutors say Ferguson abducted Kelli Hall from the St. Charles service station where she worked, sexually assaulted her and stabbed her to death. Her body was found 13 days after her abduction in Maryland Heights, another St. Louis suburb.

Attorney Jennifer Herndon has asked the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to intervene, citing concerns that Missouri's execution drug, purchased from an unnamed compounding pharmacy, could cause pain and suffering for Ferguson. Another appeal, to the U.S. Supreme Court, seeks a delay in the execution until the courts can determine other issues, including whether Ferguson's conviction was based in part on false testimony from an FBI agent.

Gov. Jay Nixon was also weighing a clemency request.

And:

Rita Linhardt, chairwoman of the board of Missourians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, said Ferguson has been a model prisoner since turning his life around behind bars and accepting Christianity. Ferguson helped start a hospice program for other inmates, facilitated a program in which victims talked to inmates about the harms of their crimes, and has counseled other inmates.

"What We Know (And Don't Know) About Missouri's Upcoming Execution," is by Chris McDaniel for St. Louis Public Radio.

On Wednesday, Missouri is scheduled to carry out another execution. Although it will be the state's fifth execution in as many months, there are still numerous unknowns. Here's what we know and don't know about the upcoming execution.

We know the state is getting its execution drug from a compounding pharmacy. Since virtually no drug manufacturer wants its product to be used in an execution, the state isn't going to a drug manufacturer. Instead, it uses what's called a compounding pharmacy to mix the drug. Compounding pharmacies are not regulated by the Food and Drug Administration and have a high failure rate. In inspections over the last decade, the Missouri Board of Pharmacy found that about one out of every five drugs failed to meet standards. That information is important because the Eighth Amendment forbids cruel and unusual punishment.

Also from Missouri, AP reports, "Saint Louis University law school to study Missouri death penalty cases."  It's via the Tribune.

A new research center at Saint Louis University's law school will analyze administration of the death penalty in Missouri over the past 25 years.

Law students, professors and researchers with the Missouri Capital-Sentencing Research Program will review the 72 executions carried out by the state since 1989 as well as the death sentences handed down to 42 additional inmates.

Earlier coverage from Missouri begins at the link.

Pharmacists Urged Not to Assist U.S. Executions

That's the title of breaking news from Associated Press Legal Affairs writer Andrew Welsh-Huggins, via the Akron Beacon Journal.

Several human rights and anti-death penalty groups have asked the American Pharmacists Association to prohibit members from participating in executions, a request that comes as states increasingly turn to pharmacists for lethal injection drugs.

The groups, which include Amnesty International, the NAACP and the American Civil Liberties Union, are targeting so-called compounded drugs. Such drugs, which are not federally regulated, are individually mixed versions of medications that prison systems are finding increasingly difficult to obtain.

And:

The pharmacists’ association is unlikely to adopt any statement at this year’s meeting because it has a long process for developing policies, spokeswoman Michelle Spinnler said in an email to The Associated Press Tuesday. She said the earliest the group’s delegates could consider any proposal would be next year.

The association previously adopted policies opposing the use of the word “drug” for chemicals used in lethal injections, and opposing laws or regulations that require or prohibit pharmacists from participating in lethal injections.

Earlier coverage from Ohio begins at the link.  Related posts are in the compounding pharmacy and lethal injection category indexes.

Oklahoma Changes LI Drug List

"Oklahoma Could Execute Inmates With Drug Combo That Left Man Gasping," is the AP report filed by Bailey Elise McBride, via HuffPost.

Facing a shortage of its traditional execution drugs, Oklahoma has revised its procedures to include the same two-drug mixture that left an Ohio inmate making gasp-like sounds as his lethal injection was carried out earlier this year, lawyers for two condemned inmates said Monday.

The attorneys said in a court filing that they were notified after business hours Friday that Oklahoma's prison system had adopted five acceptable ways to put death-row inmates to death. All involve multiple doses of sedatives that by themselves could be lethal.

And:

Now the protocols include a megadose of pentobarbital by itself, or the combination of midazolam and hydromorphone, which was used in the January execution of Dennis McGuire in Ohio. McGuire made gasp-like sounds for several minutes before being pronounced dead after 26 minutes.

Another allowed drug combo is midazolam, vecuronium bromide and potassium chloride — which has never been used in an execution in the U.S., said Jen Moreno, a staff attorney at the University of California Berkeley School of Law's Death Penalty Clinic.

"If the department is going to use one of these other methods, particularly the one that's never been used before, that's really something the courts need to look at and should have an opportunity to review before the department is allowed to use this controversial combo of drugs," she said.

The Tulsa World reports, "Oklahoma executions: DOC's expanded lethal-injection drug combinations raise questions," by Samantha Vicent.  The World article also contains a list of the chemicals and doses that form the current Oklahoma execution protocol.

Department of Corrections spokesman Jerry Massie and Director Robert Patton have previously declined to comment on the situation, citing pending litigation. Multiple requests for comment from the department and attorneys representing both sides were not returned Monday night.

Oklahoma's secrecy regarding its execution procedures makes it difficult to make statements regarding constitutionality, said Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center.

However, he said it is "concerning" that the current protocol allows the Oklahoma State Penitentiary warden sole discretion on choosing which drug combination will be used, citing an Arkansas law that was found unconstitutional in 2012 that would have given that state's Department of Corrections director similar abilities.

"The issue is that you can't give too much power to the Corrections Department," Dieter said. "I don't know the warden, but I would wonder if the warden has medical training, is aware of how the drugs work, is aware of pain and suffering.

"Oklahoma changes lethal injection procedure," by Graham Lee Brewer in the Oklahoman.

In January, the state of Ohio used a mixture of midazolam and hydromorphone, a never before used combination, in the execution of Dennis McGuire. It took McGuire 25 minutes to die in what defense attorney Allen Bohnert called a “failed, agonizing experiment.”

State Corrections Department spokesman Jerry Massie declined to confirm the change to procedure, again stating the agency would not comment on ongoing litigation. Massie deferred questions Monday to the Oklahoma attorney general’s office.

Earlier coverage of Oklahoma lethal injection issues begins at the link.

New Republic Conversation with Deborah Denno

"The Evolution of the Death Penalty in One Map," is by Lane Florsheim at the New Republic.  There is an infographic at the link.  Here's an excerpt from the beginning of the conversation:

Lane Florsheim: Your paper “Lethal Injection Secrecy Post-Baze” catalogs the numerous issues with lethal injection as an execution method. Are the drawbacks of lethal injection at odds with the public’s perception of the method?

Dr. Deborah Denno: I think the public is becoming more educated about the drawbacks of the method, because there’s been so much media coverage about these lethal injection challenges. That said, I still think there’s quite a bit of public ignorance about all the problems associated with lethal injection. Most people are used to seeing these pictures of an inmate serenely on a gurney, looking like the inmate’s going to sleep. I think that for the most part that might be the larger public perception. And we all know, that person is paralyzed, at least the people who are sort of ensconced in this issue. It’s hard to know, but I think that might still be the overwhelming public perception.

LF: Why do states that have seemingly prioritized finding a “humane” execution method for more than a century take measures to conceal problems with lethal injection like non-traditional drug sources and shifting protocols?

DD: Because what they’re doing actually conflicts very much with the effort to find a humane method of execution. I mean, it’s a catch 22.

Related posts are in the lethal injection category index.

An Update From Mississppi

"Parties: Dismiss suit over details on execution drug," is the AP reporet by Jack Elliott Jr., via the Jackson Clarion-Ledger.

The Mississippi Department of Corrections and attorneys for a death row inmate have agreed to dismiss a lawsuit over release of information on execution drugs and suppliers.

The decision to dismiss was made after the attorney general’s office and the agency provided information sought about the drugs, attorneys for Michelle Byrom said in a statement.

Special Assistant Attorney General Paul Barnes said in court documents filed this week that the Corrections Department erred in not providing the information sought by Byrom and has now done so.

Byrom and her attorneys had asked Hinds County Chancery Judge William Singletary to hold the agency in violation of Mississippi’s public records law for failing to provide information on whether the drugs are safe and reliable or whether they may have been tainted, expired, counterfeited or compromised in some way.

And:

Vanessa Carroll, an attorney with the New Orleans office of the MacArthur Justice Center, said the center has determined the Corrections Department is buying the lethal injection drugs from a compounding pharmacy in the state and that the center has determined the identity of the pharmacy.

Earlier coverage from Mississippi begins at the link.

More LI Coverage From Oklahoma

"Summary judgment sought by both sides in Oklahoma death-row inmates lawsuit over lethal drugs," is the AP report by Bailey Elise McBride, via the Greenfield Reporter.

Lawyers for two Oklahoma death-row inmates who are suing for information about lethal injection drugs and lawyers for the state each have asked for the judge to rule in their favor without hearing arguments in court.

The state filed for summary judgment in Oklahoma County District Court on Thursday and responded to a motion for summary judgment filed last week by lawyers for inmates Clayton Lockett and Charles Warner.

A hearing in district court is set for Wednesday in front of Judge Patricia Parrish on whether it's proper for the state to keep execution procedures behind a "veil of secrecy."

The Colorado Independent reports, "Democracy Now! and Susan Greene on Oklahoma’s ‘Team Pentobarbital’."

Colorado Independent Editor Susan Greene appeared on Democracy Now! Thursday morning to talk with hosts Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez about the scramble in Oklahoma reported by Katherine Fretland for The Colorado Independent this week to find drugs to conduct prisoner executions.

The story of the drug scramble highlights the way drug manufacturers — many of them headquartered in Europe — have pulled back on supplying them to avoid fueling the U.S. system of capital punishment, which has been condemned by human rights groups for decades. Responding to the shortage of drugs, state officials around the country have turned to a shadowy market supplied by pharmacies that mix unregulated versions of the drugs. These products may or may not be working properly, subjecting prisoners to unknown effects and raising questions about whether the executions where they are used are running afoul of constitutional bans on cruel and unusual punishment.

Democracy Now posts, "'Team Pentobarbital': OK Officials Joked About Seeking Football Tix for Help with Execution Drugs."  There is video and a transcript at the link.  Here's one excerpt from the interview:

SUSAN GREENE: We exposed these flippant emails back and forth between assistant attorneys general, who felt—had felt thwarted by Texas. There’s a shortage in the country of lethal injection drugs, and so they’re all sort of scrambling to find them so they can kill people on time. And Texas had apparently not supplied Oklahoma with the drugs it needed in an earlier execution. And Texas, a few years ago, was asking for help from states all around the country for how to deal with the shortage. And so these attorneys general in Oklahoma, feeling a little embittered by the lack of help from Texas, were joking that, as you said, they wanted, in exchange for their help, 50-yard-line tickets to a football game between Oklahoma and Texas. And then another colleague said, "Actually, you know, we want more than that. They should—Texas should throw the game for four years, for four years, in exchange for our help." And then, they went on to say, "Yes, you know, we should be brought onto the field during halftime and sort of lauded and celebrated for our valor in helping Texas carry out its tradition of death penalty injections, lethal injections." And then they actually took it further and said, "You know, for this, we should actually get passes to tollways and other sort of roads that cost money in Texas."

Earlier coverage from Oklahoma begins with the preceding post.  You can also jump to the Colorado Independent's reporting from earlier this week.

Texas Buys New Stock of Pentobarbital

"Texas finds new execution drug supply," is the Associated Press report filed by Michael Graczyk.  It's also available via HuffPost.  This detailed report also reviews the Texas' Open Records Act.

Texas has obtained a new batch of the drugs it uses to execute death row inmates, allowing the state to continue carrying out death sentences once its existing supply expires at the end of the month.

But correction officials will not say where they bought the drugs, arguing that information must be kept secret to protect the safety of its new supplier. In interviews with The Associated Press, officials with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice also refused to say whether providing anonymity to its new supplier of the sedative pentobarbital was a condition of its purchase.

The decision to keep details about the drugs and their source secret puts the agency at odds with past rulings of the state attorney general's office, which has said the state's open records law requires the agency to disclose specifics about the drugs it uses to carry out lethal injections.

And:

Texas law does not specifically spell out whether officials can refuse to make the name of drug suppliers public, but Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott's office has on three occasions rejected arguments by the agency that disclosing that information would put the drug supply and manufacturers at risk.

In a 2012 opinion, his office rejected the argument that disclosing the inventory would allow others to figure out the state's suppliers, dismissing the same kind of security concerns raised this week.

"Upon review, while we acknowledge the department's concerns, we find you have not established disclosure of the responsive information would create a substantial threat of physical harm to any individual," Assistant Attorney General Sean Opperman wrote.

Clark said the prison agency planned to ask Abbott to reconsider the issue.

The Houston Chronicle reports, "New shipment of legal drugs allows state to continue executions," by Allan Turner.

The Texas Department of Criminal Justice has received a new shipment of the lethal drug used in executions, allowing it to continue putting convicted killers to death through mid-May.

Prisons spokesman Jason Clark on Wednesday said the agency would have run out of pentobarbital, commonly used to euthanize pets, after two executions scheduled this month.

Three prisoners are scheduled to be executed in April; Harris County killer Robert Campbell is scheduled for execution on May 13.

Time posts, "Texas Officials Get More Execution Drugs, But Won’t Say How," by David Stout.

Earlier coverage of Texas from Texas begins with the preceding post.  Also available, more on the state's lethal injection issues.  Related posts are in the lethal injection and open records category indexes.

More Oklahoma LI Commentary & News Coverage

Today's Los Angeles Times publishes the editorial, "Oklahoma's stealth executions are an injustice."

A month from now, if all goes according to plan in Oklahoma, two convicted murderers will be executed by lethal injection, and without knowing exactly how the killing cocktail was put together or by whom. Without that knowledge, they could well be denied their basic constitutional protection against cruel and unusual punishment.

The death penalty, as we've written before, is an indefensible mess of immorality, gamed judicial processes, misapplication based on race and class, and public expense. Now we can add that, at least in Oklahoma, it is being carried out in a climate of unacceptable secrecy. If the government is going to insist that it has the right to execute citizens, it must be transparent about the process and be ready to defend it in court.

The LA Times also reports, "Oklahoma court delays executions over plan to change lethal drugs," by Molly Hennessy Fiske.

The inmates' attorneys accused the state of secretly turning to a Tulsa compounding pharmacy that has also supplied Missouri with the drugs.

Because compounding pharmacies are not regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, they argue there is a risk that inmates could suffer as they die. They believe Oklahoma used compounded pentobarbital in a January execution during which the inmate complained, "I feel my whole body burning.”
Corrections officials initially balked at identifying lethal injection drug suppliers, saying they wanted to protect their anonymity.

But in a legal filing Monday, state officials said they “remained without the drugs (pentobarbital, vecuronium bromide, potassium chloride) needed to carry out the lawful sentence of death.”

"Oklahoma Injected Lethal Drugs Into Its Death-Row Convicts–After They Were Executed," is the National Journal report by Dustin Volz.

The state of Oklahoma injected executed convicts with lethal drugs for "disposal purposes," newly published state records show.

The macabre practice, first reported Tuesday by The Colorado Independent, could tamper with postmortem toxicology results in a way that obscures from public knowledge the amount of pain endured during execution, a revelation that calls into question the state's methods for administering capital punishment at a time when lethal-injection protocols nationwide are drawing renewed scrutiny.

"Convicts executed in Oklahoma have in some cases died from overdoses of pentobarbital or sodium thiopental, the anesthetic, rather than the second and third injections in the three-drug cocktail, according to documents obtained by The Independent," reporter Katie Fretland writes. "Records show executioners then injected the remaining two drugs into convicts' dead bodies for what forms turned over in response to an open-records request refer to as 'disposal purposes.' "

 "Oklahoma court postpones executions because state can’t get drugs in time," by Lindsey Bever for the Washington Post.

The problem Oklahoma is facing is caused by the increasing reluctance of pharmaceutical companies to supply the drugs needed for lethal injections and of pharmacies to prepare the compounds necessary to ensure a quick death. Many companies based in Europe with longtime opposition to the death penalty simply stopped selling to prisons and corrections departments.

The scarcity is forcing states to search for substitutes.

Already this year, the drug shortage prompted a failed attempt in Virginia’s legislature to allow the state to use the electric chair and another in Wyoming to allow the use of firing squads. A provision in Oklahoma’s state law kept it from falling back on either option this week.

The Guardian posts, "Oklahoma delays two executions amid lethal drugs shortage," by Amanda Holpuc.

US states have faced increasing difficulty in obtaining the drugs needed for an execution following a European-lead boycott.

Oklahoma’s execution process requires pentobarbital as a sedative, vecuronium bromide as a muscle relaxant and a third drug to stop the heart. Oklahoma said on Monday that it did not have any remaining supplies of those drugs.

"Okla. delays 2 executions because of drug shortage," by Gregg Zoroya at USA Today.

The struggle to procure pharmaceuticals plays out as executions appear to be on the decline. Although a majority of states -- 32-- still have the death penalty, the number of executions has fallen from 98 in 1999 to 39 last year.

In recent years, New York, New Jersey, New Mexico, Illinois, Connecticut and Maryland have abolished the death sentence; and governors in Washington, Colorado and Oregon have suspended the punishment. Courts have halted executions in Georgia, Arkansas, Tennessee and Louisiana over lethal injection issues.

Like many states that turned to this method in recent decades -- rejecting age-old methods such as electrocution, gas chamber or firing squad -- Oklahoma state officials use a three-drug protocol. They first anesthetize the condemned with a barbiturate such as pentobarbital, then paralyze them with vecuronium bromide and stop their hearts with potassium chloride.

Additional coverage includes, "Oklahoma executions postponed after state fails to procure drugs," at Reuters.

"US halts 2 executions over drug shortage," by AFP, via News 24.

Al Jazeera America posts, "Oklahoma unable to buy lethal injection drugs for upcoming execution."

"Oklahoma delays two executions due to lack of drugs," by Sarah Muller at MSNBC.

"Oklahoma Ran Out of Drugs to Execute People, And That’s a Sign of Things to Come," by Josh Sanburn at Time.

"Oklahoma postponed two executions because it ran out of lethal injection drugs," by Jon Terbush for the Week.

"Oklahoma delays two executions due to lack of drugs needed for lethal injection," by Martha Neil at ABA Journal.

Earlier coverage of Oklahoma lethal injection issues begins at the link.

Texas Execution Scheduled for Wednesday

Texas is set to carry out its third execution of 2014, Wednesday night in Huntsville.  It would be the 511th post-Furman Texas execution since 1982. Texas is responsible for more than 37% of the nation's post-Furman executions.

"Rapper set to die for killing studio owner" is the AP report, via KTRK-TV.

San Antonio rap musician Ray Jasper has never disputed his involvement in an attack and robbery more than 15 years ago that left a 33-year-old recording studio owner dead.

But Jasper testified at his capital murder trial that although he cut the throat of David Alejandro, a partner was responsible for the victim's fatal stab wounds.

A Bexar County jury wasn't convinced and deliberated only 15 minutes at Jasper's January 2000 trial before convicting him. The panel then took less than two hours to decide he should be put to death.

There have been 10 executions in American death penalty states this year; a total of 1,369 post-Furman execution since 1977.

Houston's KPFT-FM will host Execution Watch on the web and its HD radio broadcast signal beginning at 6:00 p.m. (CDT), Wednesday evening.

According to TDCJ, Texas state district courts have set five additional execution dates.

Earlier coverage of Ray Jasper and his case begins at the link.

Oklahoma Update - DoC Document Release, Executions Postponed

The Oklahoma Department of Corrections documents obtained by the Colorado Independent are available at DocStoc.

"Oklahoma scrambles to find lethal injections for two imminent executions," is Katie Fretland's report for the Independent.  Here's the beginning of this must-read:

A national scarcity of lethal-injection drugs has postponed two executions Oklahoma planned for this week and next.

Complaints about that state’s secrecy around death penalty procedures convinced the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals today to delay the execution of Clayton Lockett from this Thursday to April 22, and the execution of Charles Warner from March 27 to April 29.

The murder convicts’ defense lawyers – including members of Colorado’s federal public defenders office – are seeking to stop the executions because of Oklahoma’s involvement in seeking potentially unregulated lethal injections in an era when pharmaceutical companies have yanked the drugs off the market for death penalty use.

Oklahoma announced Monday that its secret deal to buy lethal injections fell through, highlighting a shadowy market for death penalty drugs and raising questions about protecting secret drug suppliers from public scrutiny. Records obtained by The Colorado Independent reveal a disturbing flippancy among high-level officials who have been involved with executions in Oklahoma.

Meanwhile, AP reports, "Oklahoma Court Resets Executions Amid Drug Search."  It's by Bailey Elise McBride, via ABC News.

An Oklahoma court on Tuesday rescheduled a pair of executions set for this week and next so state prison officials will have more time to find a supply of drugs for the lethal injections.

The decision came in a lawsuit in which two inmates had sought more information about the drugs that would be used to execute them later this month. The inmates had sought a stay of their executions, but the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals said that request was moot because the state Department of Corrections doesn't have enough drugs on hand to carry out their death sentences.

"The attorney general's attestations give this court no confidence that the state will be able to procure the necessary drugs before the scheduled executions are carried out," the court wrote.

While the judges didn't rule on the merit of the inmates' stay request, they pushed their executions back a month — Clayton Lockett to April 22 and Charles Warner to April 29.

"Executions postponed so state can procure lethal drugs," is by Cary Aspinwall for the Tulsa World.

The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals has vacated two upcoming execution dates and moved both to April, to allow the Department of Corrections time to procure two of the drugs it needs for lethal injections.

State officials revealed Monday that they were having trouble obtaining the approved drugs for the first two stages of Oklahoma’s three-part lethal injection cocktail.

And:

State corrections officials have been told that pentobarbital remains in short supply and vecuronium bromide is now "difficult, if not impossible, even for hospitals and medical professionals to obtain."

The state intends to pursue "any and all leads" to obtain the lethal injection drugs and proceed with the executions as planned, according to the Attorney General’s Office.

Madeline Cohen, a federal public defender representing Warner, said: “We are relieved that the OCCA's decision allows Mr. Warner and Mr. Lockett to proceed on their constitutional challenge to Oklahoma's execution-secrecy law and execution protocol. We hope that no execution will go forward until we are able to obtain full information about how Oklahoma intends to conduct those executions, including the source of its execution drugs.”

"Oklahoma Executions Delayed Amid Drug Shortage," is the NBC report by Tracy Connor.

At least two compounding pharmacies have reneged on deals to provide lethal injection drugs amid public pressure and legal challenges.

Against this backdrop, states are eager to keep the source of their chemicals secret — sparking lawsuits like the one filed by Warner and Lockett, who say the information must be made public.

Their argument: the prisoners' legal teams must be able to insure the drugs won't cause suffering that would violate the constitutional protection against cruel and unusual punishment.

Earlier coverage of Oklahoma lethal injection issues begins at the link.

Oklahoma Lacks LI Drug for Scheduled Execution

Associated Press reports, "Okla. lawyers: Drugs not available for execution," by Bailey Elise McBride.  It's via the San Francisco Chronicle.

Oklahoma does not have all of the lethal drugs necessary to carry out an execution set for this week, the state attorney general said Monday, and the prisons agency says a quirk in the law prevents the state from switching to electrocution or firing squad.

Despite the drug shortage, lawyers for the state are fighting an attempt by two inmates to delay their executions as the condemned men seek more information about Oklahoma's execution procedures.

Assistant Attorney General Seth Branham says the Oklahoma Department of Corrections is attempting to obtain suitable execution drugs.

"This has been nothing short of a Herculean effort, undertaken with the sole objective of carrying out ODOC's duty under Oklahoma law to conduct Appellants' executions," Branham wrote in a brief to the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals filed Monday. "Sadly, this effort has (so far) been unsuccessful."

The attorney general's office said in the briefs that a deal to obtain pentobarbital and vecuronium bromide from a pharmacy had fallen through. It did not identify the pharmacy.

"AG brief says Oklahoma does not have drugs needed for Thursday execution" is the Oklahoman report by Graham Lee Brewer.

The brief describes how the state Corrections Department had “a commitment from a pharmacy to supply the drugs,” but by Friday that commitment had fallen through. This contradicts a statement by state Corrections Department spokesmen Jerry Massie to The Oklahoman in February. Massie said at the time that Oklahoma had 10 doses of pentobarbital.

Massie declined to comment Monday, saying the department would not discuss any ongoing legal matters.

"State lacks drugs to carry out Thursday execution, records show is by Cary Aspinwall for the Tulsa World.

Officials have been told that pentobarbital remains in short supply and vecuronium bromide is now “difficult, if not impossible, even for hospitals and medical professionals to obtain.”

Both Warner and Lockett have challenged the constitutionality of Oklahoma’s attempts to conceal the source of its execution drugs and have asked the court to stay their executions.

Attorneys for both inmates and the Attorney General’s Office filed briefs in support of their case on Monday morning.

NBC News reports, "Oklahoma Can't Find Drugs for Planned Executions," by Tracy Connor.

The state said it was considering a last-minute change to its protocol, but conceded that would most likely trigger another round of legal objections.

Defense lawyer Madeline Cohen noted that the state made no mention of what drugs it might use or whether they have ever been used in any executions.

 Earlier coverage of Oklahoma lethal injection issues begins at the link.

Missouri Legislators Hear Death Penalty Bills

"Senate panel reviews Missouri death penalty bills," is the AP report filed by Chris Blank.  It's via the San Francisco Chronicle. Here's the beginning:

Proposals taking aim at Missouri's death penalty procedures were examined Wednesday by the Senate's only Democratic-led committee.

Senate Minority Leader Jolie Justus, of Kansas City, said she plans to combine measures and get legislation that could potentially be debated by the full Republican-controlled chamber.

Justus has proposed creating an 11-member commission that would establish procedures and protocols for executions. Commission members would include a current or retired prosecutor and public defender, judges, health care workers and a crime victim advocate appointed by the governor. The commission would have one year and no executions would be carried out until then.

Another bill filed by Republican Sen. Rob Schaaf seeks to require that the Department of Corrections promulgate formal rules for carrying out executions. It also would bar officials from using cash to buy execution gas or chemicals and would forbid the inclusion of suppliers on the state's execution team. A state privacy law protects the identity of those on the execution team.

The legislation heard includes:

SB 787 - Execution commission
SB 804 - Death penalty procedures
SB 775 - Death penalty moratorium

More information on the legislation is available at the Missouri General Assembly website.

Earlier coverage from Missouri begins at the link.

Missouri's Lethal Injection Secrecy

St. Louis Public Radio posts, "Political Rundown: Legislative Deals, Disabilities, Death," by Susan Hegger.

Our own reporter Chris McDaniel is one of the sources interviewed in "Under the Hangman's Hood," a recent story in the Columbia Journalism Review about the difficulties journalists face in covering the death penalty as states cloak executions under layers and layers of secrecy. As the article notes, Missouri is spearheading a somewhat dubious trend.

Missouri is "at the forefront of a nationwide battle over transparency and secrecy in capital punishment, in which states, responding to gains made by death-penalty opponents, have increasingly moved to conceal execution protocols — or the identities of people who help in any way to carry them out — from public view."

Execution is, as the article notes, the "gravest action a state can take against one of its citizens." As such, it would seem a matter of intrinsic public interest. So do the people of Missouri -- in whose name executions are carried out -- have the right to know whether this "gravest action" is implemented legally and ethically?

Apparently not. When the St. Louis Post-Dispatch discovered that an incompetent doctor was overseeing Missouri's executions, Missouri responded by making it illegal to reveal “the identity of a current or former member of an execution team.” Last year, "the ban was broadened to include even the pharmacies that now compound lethal drugs for the state."

 The Columbia Journalism Review report is, "The First Amendment vs. death penalty secrecy laws," by Deron Lee.  It's a must-read:

“Their answer to the public finding out they had an incompetent doctor was making it impossible to find out who the doctor is,” says Tony Rothert, legal director at ACLU of Missouri, which has fought the state in numerous death-penalty cases.

Executions have since resumed in Missouri; there have been four in the last four months alone. But the prohibition against identifying members of the “execution team” remains. And last fall, the ban was broadened to include even the pharmacies that now compound lethal drugs for the state—a move that challenges news organizations’ freedom to report on the state’s brewing death-penalty debate and has reportedly stopped the ACLU and lawyers for condemned inmates from sharing information with journalists. The civil-liberties group has filed a lawsuit against the state, arguing that the application of the law is an unconstitutional violation of the First Amendment.

The legal challenge puts Missouri at the forefront of a nationwide battle over transparency and secrecy in capital punishment, in which states, responding to gains made by death-penalty opponents, have increasingly moved to conceal execution protocols—or the identities of people who help in any way to carry them out—from public view. The trend has frustrated death-penalty opponents and lawyers for convicts sentenced to death. It has also raised alarm among champions of free speech.

Earlier coverage from Missouri, and more on state secrecy and LI drugs, at the links.

The Louisiana LI Challenge

"Louisiana appeals order to release execution drug source," is the AP report by Melinda Deslatte, via the Alexandria Town Talk.

Rather than release the seller and manufacturer of Louisiana's execution drugs, state corrections officials notified a federal judge Tuesday that they were asking an appeals court to overturn his disclosure order.

U.S. District Judge James Brady had ruled that the corrections department must reveal by this week the information about where it obtained its two lethal injection drugs.

Instead of filing the information, a lawyer for the Department of Corrections and the Louisiana State Penitentiary filed a notice of appeal and asked to keep the information secret while the appeal is pending.

Attorney James Hilburn described the judge's order as "an abuse of discretion."

Corrections Secretary Jimmy LeBlanc and state prison Warden Burl Cain have argued that if they identify how they're getting the drugs, they could have trouble buying more because companies don't want to be known as helping facilitate an execution.

The Lens posts, "State appeals judge’s order to reveal source of lethal injection drug." by Della Hasselle.

Lawyers for the state Department of Corrections haven’t complied with a federal judge’s order to disclose information about the source of Louisiana’s lethal injection drugs, instead asking an appeals court to reverse the decision.

Lawyers representing a convicted child-killer on death row responded Tuesday, saying this “is simply the latest effort by the Defendants to shroud their lethal injection protocol in secrecy.”

Last week, U.S. District Court Judge James Brady ordered the state to reveal the manufacturer and source of the lethal injection drugs that officials plan to use in execution.

Earlier coverage of the Louisiana lethal injection challenge begins at the link.

Oklahoma Inmates Seek Stay of Execution

"2 Oklahoma death row inmates seek stay for appeal," is by Bailey Elise McBride of Associated Press.  It's via the San Francisco Chronicle.

Lawyers for two Oklahoma death row inmates on Tuesday asked the Oklahoma Supreme Court for a stay of execution while their lawsuit makes its way through state court.

Attorneys for Clayton Lockett and Charles Warner simultaneously filed an appeal and an emergency application for a stay of execution to the state's highest court, writing the inmates "will suffer irreparable harm" if a stay is not granted. Oklahoma County District Judge Patricia Parrish on Monday denied their request to halt the executions that are scheduled for later this month.

Parrish denied the request on grounds that the case was not under her jurisdiction. Lockett and Warner sued the Oklahoma Department of Corrections last month, challenging a law that bars disclosure of the state's execution procedures.

The Oklahoman reports, "Death row inmates ask Oklahoma Supreme Court for a stay of execution," by Graham Lee Brewer.

The men are not appealing their sentences, but are asking for a delay in their executions until their case is adjudicated. Clayton Derrell Locket, 38, is scheduled for execution March 20, and Charles Frederick Warner, 46, is scheduled for execution March 27.

Lockett and Warner are challenging the constitutionality of the state law allowing the state Corrections Department to shield its source of pentobarbital, a barbiturate used in Oklahoma’s lethal injection process, and whether or not a change allowing the use of pentobarbital was a violation of the Oklahoma Administrative Procedures Act.

Monday, Oklahoma County District Court Judge Patricia Parrish agreed with an objection filed by the state attorney general’s office which asserts since the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals set the execution dates and denied previous appeals by the men, the appeals court is the proper venue to hear the case.

Earlier coverage of the Oklahoma LI drug challenge begins at the link.

A Shady Deal in Georgia?

"Did lethal injection doctor get a special deal?" is by Rhonda Cook in today's Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

A physician with a years-long relationship with the Georgia Department of Corrections has bought a 700-bed former prison for $50,000 — half its appraised value — and stands to make millions running it as a nursing home for old and sick parolees.

At least one competing business complains that the state gave Dr. Carlo Musso, who has conducted its executions, a sweetheart deal and did not give others a realistic shot at the property.

The sale was completed on Thursday. But documents obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution show the state began talking about the property with Musso exclusively, at least three years ago, long before advertising it for sale. DOC’s talks with Musso then were about leasing the now closed Bostick State Prison in a deal that would have netted the state almost $537,000 a year in rent. The state would have also invested roughly $8 million in renovations, $2 million of it in prison labor.

Fast forward to last summer, and Musso submitted the lone bid to buy the property, on the grounds of the now closed Central State Hospital, for little more than what a month’s rent would have been under the lease deal that had been discussed.

Creative Loafing Atlanta references the Journal-Constitution enterprise reporting in, "Georgia's DOC accused of giving former lethal injection doctor special treatment in property deal," by Max Blau.

Questions are being raised over whether Dr. Carlo Musso, a former lethal injection doctor for the Georgia Department of Corrections, received special treatment in purchasing a 700-bed prison for half of its estimated value. "How much state government assistance should a private citizen get in launching a private for-profit business?" Sara Totonchi, executive director of the Southern Center for Human Rights, told the AJC. "Carlo Musso has found a cash cow in Corrections."

Earlier coverage from Georgia begins at the link.

No Stay in Oklahoma LI Challenge

"No delay for executions during drug suit," is AP coverage, via the Muskogee Phoenix.

An Oklahoma County district judge ruled Monday that she would not delay the executions of two death row inmates scheduled for later this month while the inmates challenge the state over the origins of the drugs used to carry out the death penalty.

Citing a 1992 state Supreme Court decision, District Court Judge Patricia Parrish said the state Court of Criminal Appeals, which sets execution dates, must decide on requests for stays of execution. State lawyers earlier Monday filed an objection stating Parrish has no jurisdiction in the case.

Susanna M. Gattoni, one of the lawyers for Lockett and Warner, said her office would appeal Parrish’s decision with the Oklahoma Supreme Court within 24 hours.

Parrish said, however, that she or another civil judge could handle the death row inmates’ challenge to the state’s execution procedure because the Court of Criminal Appeals does not have jurisdiction to rule in a civil matter. Clayton Lockett and Charles Warner have sued the Oklahoma Department of Corrections to learn more about the drugs that would be used to execute them.

The Oklahoman reports, "Judge denies stay of execution for two Oklahoma inmates," by Graham Lee Brewer.

The state Attorney General’s Office filed an objection to the restraining order early Monday morning in which it asserts the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals is the proper venue to hear the case. That court would be the third to hear the case. The restraining order was originally scheduled for hearing in district court, but the case was moved to federal court last week at the request of the state and then moved back to district court by a federal judge.

At the Monday hearing, attorneys for both parties discussed the lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the law allowing the state to shield the identity of its source of pentobarbital, a barbiturate used in the lethal injection process.

Earlier coverage of the Oklahoma lethal injection challenge begins at the link.

Adam Liptak on LI Drug Secrecy

Today's New York Times Sidebar column by Adam Liptak is, "Deciding if Inmates Get to Know How They’ll Be Executed."  Here's the beginning of this must-read:

 The capital justice system is in turmoil, with drug shortages leading states to use secret and suspect chemicals to execute condemned inmates.

“We’ve never seen so many changes and so many troubles in getting these drugs,” said Deborah Denno, a law professor at Fordham and a leading authority on methods of execution. “The states are more secret than they’ve ever been. And it’s a much riskier process than it’s ever been.”

In a little-noticed dissent last month, three Supreme Court justices suggested that it was time for their court to resolve the crucial threshold question: Are death row inmates entitled to know how the government means to kill them?

That information is a “state secret,” prison officials say. But it is hard to see how death row inmates can argue that a given method of execution violates the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment if they are barred from knowing what the method is.

The dissent, written by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on Feb. 25, was only a sentence long. It said that she, along with Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, would have granted a stay of execution to a condemned inmate in Missouri so the court could consider whether to hear his appeal “in the ordinary course.” The inmate, Michael A. Taylor, was executed hours later, just after midnight.

The dissent was, in truth, pretty cryptic. But Justice Ginsburg tipped her hand with one phrase, saying a hard look at the case was needed “for reasons well stated” by Judge Kermit E. Bye of the federal appeals court in St. Louis. Judge Bye had filed a statement when he failed to persuade his court to stop Mr. Taylor’s execution.

Earlier coverage of the scramble for lethal injection drugs begins at the link.  Also available, more on Missouri's execution of Michael Taylor and Judge Bye's dissent.

Death Penalty in U.S. Spurs Wild West Scramble for Drugs

That's the title of a must-read recap of the current status of the scramble for LI drugs by departments of corrections, by Gregg Zoroya in USA Today.  It's subtitled, "Capital punishment in the USA is in decline as states wrestle to find drugs for lethal injections."

Here's the beginning:

Prison guards meet in the desert to hand off chemicals for executions. A corrections boss loaded with cash travels to a pharmacy in another state to buy lethal sedatives. States across the country refuse to identify the drugs they use to put the condemned to death.

This is the curious state of capital punishment in America today.

Manufacturers are cutting off supplies of lethal injection drugs because of opposition to the death penalty, and prison officials are scrambling to make up the deficit — sharing drugs, buying them from under-regulated pharmacies or using drug combinations never employed before in putting someone to death.

At the same time, growing numbers of states are ending capital punishment altogether. Others are delaying executions until they have a better understanding of what chemicals work best. And the media report blow-by-blow details of prisoners gasping, snorting or crying out during improvised lethal injection, taking seemingly forever to die.

The last major multi-jurisdictional news article on the topic is at the list.  Related posts are in the lethal injection category index.

Oklahoma OpEd

"Oklahoma's secrecy over execution drugs is wrong," is the Oklahoman OpEd by Oklahoma State University professor Joel Senat.

A recent lawsuit filed by two Oklahoma death row inmates should remind opponents and proponents of the death penalty why open government is crucial to an informed public’s oversight of its policymakers.

The inmates, scheduled for March executions, sued the Department of Corrections because Oklahoma law keeps secret — even from the prisoners and the courts — the supplier of the lethal injection drugs used in its executions. The statute even exempts the purchase of the drugs from the state’s Central Purchasing Act. Such secrecy in government typically breeds corruption, incompetency and inefficiency.

Earlier coverage of Oklahoma lethal injection issues begins at the link.

Oklahoma LI Challenge Update

The Oklahoman reports, "Motion filed to send Oklahoma death row inmates' lawsuit back to district court," by Graham Lee Brewer.

Lawyers representing two Oklahoma death row inmates who are suing the state have filed a motion to have their case moved back to the Oklahoma County District Court. The case against the state Corrections Department was moved to federal court Tuesday at the request of the state.

Clayton Lockett, 38, and Charles Warner, 46, filed a lawsuit late last month challenging an Oklahoma law that allows the state to keep secret its source of the lethal injection drugs it will use to execute the two men.

According to the petition, both Lockett and Warner believe their inability to know the source of the drugs or their quality suggests Oklahoma’s execution method carries with it “a substantial risk of inflicting severe pain,” which would violate their constitutional rights against cruel and unusual punishment.

And:

Lawyers for the two men say an amended complaint will be filed, removing all federal-law claims and instead relying on the Oklahoma Constitution and statute, placing it firmly in the jurisdiction of district court.

"Oklahoma, inmates at odds over execution drug suit," is AP coverage by Bailey Elise McBride, via the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

Lawyers for the state of Oklahoma and for a pair of inmates who have challenged the "veil of secrecy" surrounding the state's execution drugs can't agree whether their fight should be heard in state or federal court.

Oklahoma's attorney general's office has petitioned to have the inmates' lawsuit transferred to U.S. District Court, saying a federal judge should consider it because the inmates are invoking claims to constitutional rights. The men's lawyers say a state judge should hear challenges to state statutes.

While the lawyers fight it out, execution preparations will continue for Clayton Lockett and Charles Warner, who are due to be put to death this month at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary at McAlester, said Jerry Massie, a Corrections Department spokesman.

"Oklahoma board denies clemency for convicted murderer currently suing state," is also by Graham Lee Bruner in the Oklahoman.

The Oklahoma Pardon and Parole Board on Tuesday denied convicted murderer Charles Frederick Warner’s request that his execution be commuted to a life sentence.

Warner, 46, is scheduled for lethal injection March 27 for raping and killing 11-month-old Adriana Waller in 1997. The infant was the child of his girlfriend. Warner was given the death penalty for the killing and 75 years for the rape.

The board voted 4-1 to deny Warner’s request for clemency.

At the hearing, Warner’s public defender showed the board a recent video interview with Adriana’s mother, Shonda Waller, where Waller said executing Warner would only cause her more trauma. Waller said that while she does not want Warner to ever leave prison, she is morally opposed to the death penalty and does not want his execution to take place on behalf of either herself or the memory of her daughter.

Earlier coverage from Oklahoma begins at the link.

Missouri Lethal Injection Drug News

St. Louis Public Radio posts, "How Missouri Got Ahold Of Its Backup Execution Drug," by Chris McDaniel.  There are documents at the link.

When Missouri's execution drug supplier backed out after facing a lawsuit, the state found another pharmacy willing to sell it pentobarbital. But if that proved impossible, Missouri also had another option: It could use its controversial backup drug, midazolam.

Midazolam is a drug used to treat insomnia. It's the drug Ohio used in a recent execution that took more than 20 minutes, with witnesses reporting that the inmate gasped and snorted during that time.

In a sworn deposition in January, David Dormire, director of adult institutions, said Missouri didn't have midazolam. Later in the questioning, though, he changed his mind.

"I was reminded we had purchased that as a backup," Dormire said.

Earlier coverage of Missouri lethal injection issues begins at the link.

Should a Defense Lawyer Have to Decide How His Client Should Die?

That's the title of Andrew Cohen's latest at the Atlantic.  It's subtitled, "Legal ethicists are alarmed by a recent federal appeals court ruling that requires attorneys to suggest alternatives to the lethal injection procedures they deem unconstitutional."  Here's the beginning:

May a court compel a defense attorney to breach her ethical duties to her client in a death penalty case? More precisely, when an inmate's counsel is asserting that a state's lethal injection procedure violates the Eighth Amendment's prohibition against "cruel and unusual" punishment, should she be required to suggest an alternative? 

However you phrase it, this profound question has arisen in Missouri after a group of prisoners challenged the state's dubious lethal injection protocols, and the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued a January ruling denying them relief.  Those prisoners have now asked the United States Supreme Court to accept their case for review, arguing that the 8th Circuit plainly misinterpreted the Supreme Court's 2008 ruling in Baze v. Rees.

The idea that judges would force defense attorneys to do the government's job of identifying viable lethal injection options has alarmed legal ethicists. Last week, for example, the folks at the Ethics Bureau at Yale Law School urged the justices to overturn the 8th Circuit's ruling because it "flies in the face" of a lawyer's obligations to her client.  Neither the Sixth Amendment, the Eighth Amendment, nor the Supreme Court's ruling in Baze demand such a result, they argue.

Earlier coverage of Missouri lethal injection issues begins at the link.  You can find more from Andrew Cohen at the Atlantic.

NBC News Examines LI Secrecy

"Will Courts Lift Veil of Secrecy Around Lethal Injections?" is Pete Williams' report at NBC News.

Despite growing controversy over the use of anonymous pharmacies for lethal injections, the U.S. Supreme Court has thus far declined to block any executions based on 11th-hour appeals challenging the drug connections.

That includes the case of Michael Taylor, a convicted rapist and murderer who was put to death at 12:10 a.m. Wednesday in Missouri after a furious legal battle that stretched into the night.

It's worth nothing, however, that three high court justices wanted to block Taylor's execution and cited the words of an appeals judge who said so little was known about the source of the deadly dose of pentobarbital that it "could be nothing more than a high school chemistry class."

The strongly worded dissent from Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Kermit Bye — echoed by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan — is giving some defense lawyers hope the veil of secrecy will be lifted by the judiciary.

"It seems that the issues raised in Judge Bye's dissent are starting to at least resonate with some members of the Supreme Court," said Allen Bohnert, a federal capital defender from Ohio.

More on the Bye dissent and coverage of Missouri lethal injection issues, at the link.

Pennsylvania's LI Drugs

Philadelphia Public Radio WHYY-FM NewsWorks reports, "Obtaining lethal injection drugs no problem for Pa. DOC." by Mary Wilson.  There is audio at the link.

While other states face a shortage of lethal injection drugs used in executions, Pennsylvania's supply isn't a problem.

A nationwide shortage of lethal injection drugs comes as more pharmacies that mix dosages for clients decided not to provide execution drugs due to negative publicity, as well as legal and ethical concerns.

Pennsylvania has obtained its trio of lethal injection drugs from such pharmacies, and is facing an active federal class-action challenge to its execution protocol.

Still, the drugs remain readily available, according to Sue McNaughton, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Corrections.

And:

The last execution in Pennsylvania was 15 years ago while Tom Ridge was governor. As of Feb. 4, 190 people were listed on death row in the state.

Earlier coverage from Pennsylvania begins at the link.  Related posts are in the compounding pharmacy, department of corrections, and lethal injection category indexes.

Judge Bye on Missouri Practices

The U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit's en banc ruling in Taylor v. Lombardi, with Judge Bye's dissent, is available in Adobe .pdf format.

The Guardian reports, "US judge attacks states' lethal injection methods as 'high school chemistry'," by Ed Pilkington.  Here's the beginning of this must-read:

A federal appeals court judge has issued a scathing attack on the secret use by death penalty states of compounding pharmacies to supply drugs deployed in lethal injections, ridiculing the source of Wednesday morning’s execution in Missouri as possibly “nothing more than a high school chemistry class”.

Kermit Bye, a federal judge on the US court of appeals for the eighth circuit, issued his dissent just hours before Michael Taylor, 47, was executed for the 1989 murder of a 15-year-old girl, Ann Harrison, in Kansas City. Taylor was put to death using a massive dose of the sedative pentobarbital obtained by the department of corrections from a pharmacist whose identity the state refused to disclose.

The eighth circuit declined to award Taylor a stay of execution, as did the US supreme court that cleared the way for the lethal injection to go ahead. But in his dissent, Bye made one of the most impassioned arguments yet from a federal judge decrying the creeping secrecy in the practice of the death penalty in America.

He pointed out that the eighth amendment of the US constitution “prohibits the unnecessary and wanton infliction of pain through torture, barbarous methods, or methods resulting in a lingering death”. Bye then went on to argue that given “the absolute dearth of information Missouri has disclosed to this court, the ‘pharmacy’ on which Missouri relies could be nothing more than a high school chemistry class.”

He added: “I once again fear Missouri elevates the ends over the means in its rush to execute Taylor.”

Smithsonian Magazine posts, "A Drug Company Tried to Block the Use of Pentobarbital in Executions, But U.S. States Are Finding Ways Around the Ban," by Rachel Nuwer.

"Secret Execution Drugs Used Again in Missouri," is by Lauren Galik at Reason.

Also from Missouri, AP reports, "Lawmaker wants more death penalty oversight," via KBIA-FM.

Republican Rep. Eric Burlison said Wednesday that his bill would make Missouri's lethal injection method more transparent and accountable to the public.

The measure would require the state Corrections Department to submit a formal outline of an execution procedure to a legislative panel. The panel could then conduct hearings and take public comment on the proposed execution method. The full Legislature would also be able to veto the proposed method.

"Missouri senator proposes death penalty bill," is another AP filing, also via KBIA-FM.

A Missouri Republican is proposing legislation intended to speed executions of those who kidnapped their murder victims.

The legislation would limit extensions for appeals, and the Missouri Supreme Court would need to hear arguments in a case within six months of submission of the last written argument. The high court would have another six months to issue its decision.

Earlier coverage from Missouri begins at the link.

Oklahoma Lethal Injection Challenge Filed

You can read the lawsuit, Lockett & Warner v. Evans, thanks to the Tulsa World.

"Judge schedules Tuesday hearing on challenge to Oklahoma's death row procedures," is the AP report, via the Greenfield Reporter.

An Oklahoma County judge next week will consider whether to delay the scheduled executions of two death row inmates.

Clayton Lockett and Charles Warner want to know more about drugs administered by the state Department of Corrections during executions. They've asked District Judge Patricia Parrish to delay their executions until the state says how and when it obtained the drugs.

Parrish will hold a hearing Tuesday morning.

Lockett is scheduled to die March 20 and Warner is to die a week later.

An earlier AP report is, "Oklahoma death row inmates sue over drugs' secrecy," by Bailey Elise McBride.

Under state law, no one may disclose who provides Oklahoma with the three drugs it uses to execute condemned prisoners. Lawyers for Charles Warner and Clayton Lockett fear the men could suffer severe pain if Oklahoma is allowed to maintain a "veil of secrecy."

"Plaintiffs have no means to determine the purity of the drug which may be used to execute them, and whether that drug is contaminated with either particulate foreign matter or a microbial biohazard that could lead to a severe allergic reaction upon injection," the lawyers wrote in their state court lawsuit.

"'Cloak of secrecy' on executions alleged in Oklahoma death row inmates' lawsuit," is by Ziva Branstetter for the Tulsa World.

Two Oklahoma inmates who are set to be executed next month have sued the state over its "cloak of secrecy" involving the death penalty.

The suit by attorneys for Clayton Lockett and Charles Warner asks a judge to invalidate a state law barring the release of information about drugs used in executions. It also asks for relief including an injunction against executing Lockett and Warner until details about execution drugs are provided to their attorneys.

The suit was filed Wednesday in Oklahoma County District Court against the Department of Corrections and its director, Edward Evans.

And:

In 2011, a change in state law made the source of drugs used in executions confidential and gave more control to the DOC in how to carry them out. The change occurred after the only FDA-approved manufacturers of two execution drugs blocked their use in U.S. executions.

In 2012, the DOC publicly stated that it had obtained 20 doses of pentobarbital, one of three drugs used in executions.

Since then, the state has executed 11 people, and "plaintiffs have been unable to obtain any information about how many still remain of the 20 doses ... or whether any or all of those doses are expired," the lawsuit states.

The Oklahoman reports, "Two Oklahoma death row inmates sue state Corrections Department over lethal injection secrecy," by Graham Lee Brewe.

Two Oklahoma death row inmates are challenging the constitutionality of the law allowing the state to keep secret its source of lethal injection drugs.

According to the lawsuit filed Wednesday in Oklahoma County District Court, Clayton Lockett and Charles Warner have reason to believe Oklahoma’s execution method carries with it “a substantial risk of inflicting severe pain,” which would violate their constitutional rights against cruel and unusual punishment.

And:

Assistant Federal Public Defender Madeline Cohen, who represents Warner, makes much the same argument attorneys representing a Missouri death row inmate made in recent months, that the policy of secrecy by the state Corrections Department keeps death row inmates from knowing the quality of the drug that will be used to kill them.

Cohen contends Pentobarbital, a barbiturate used in the execution process to render the condemned person unconscious, doesn’t stop the inmate from feeling pain but only works to keep them paralyzed.

“The second drug is basically only used for optics, to make the execution look placid,” Cohen said.

On Jan. 9, Michael Lee Wilson, 38, was put to death by the state for participating in the 1995 murder of Tulsa store clerk Richard Yost. Wilson’s final words were “I feel my whole body burning.” The petition filed Wednesday uses his last words as an example of the uncertainty of the process.

The Los Angeles Times posts, "Condemned Oklahoma inmates sue: What's in the drug that will kill us?"  It's by Molly Hennessy-Fiske.

Oklahoma, Ohio, Missouri and other death penalty states have been scrambling for lethal injection drugs after major manufacturers — many based in Europe with longtime opposition to the death penalty — stopped selling to them.

The issue sparked national controversy last month when relatives of an Ohio inmate who witnessed his execution complained that he took more than 15 minutes to die, appearing to gasp and snort. They have since sued the state and drug makers.

Previously, inmates received a sedative while paralytic drugs killed them. As supplies dried up of the sedative, sodium thiopentol, some states switched to another drug, pentobarbitol, and stopped disclosing information about lethal injections.

Earlier coverage from Oklahoma begins at the link.  Also available, news coverage of a lawsuit against an Oklahoma compounding pharmacy linked to supplying lethal injection drugs.

Missouri, the New Ground Zero

"'Ground zero' for the death penalty," is by Tal Kopan for Politico.  Here's the beginning:

Missouri executed its fourth inmate in as many months early Wednesday, even as the issue of capital punishment has sparked a new and reshaped political debate in the state and across the country.

The Midwestern state has become a key battleground: As lethal-injection drug supplies have been disrupted, states have been scrambling to adapt, and Missouri lawmakers from both sides of the aisle aren’t happy with what they say is excessive secrecy about the process and questions about whether the sentences are being competently carried out.

The issue crosses party lines. Missouri’s Democratic governor and attorney general are both pro-death penalty, while some bills recently filed to challenge the executive’s approach to executions are sponsored by Republicans who also back capital punishment.

Earlier coverage from Missouri begins with the preceding post.

Missouri Executes

The Supreme Court issued several orders in the case last night.  In one order denying writ of certiorari, Justice Ginsburg, joined by Justices Sotomayor and Kagen, dissented.

For reasons well stated by Judge Bye in his statement calling for Eighth Circuit rehearing en banc, I would grant the stay and consider the petition for certiorari in the ordinary course.

 "Missouri executes man for '89 rape, killing of teen," is the Associated Press report, via the Daily Journal.

A Missouri inmate was executed early Wednesday for abducting, raping and killing a Kansas City teenager as she waited for her school bus in 1989, marking the state’s fourth execution by lethal injection in as many months.

Michael Taylor, 47, was pronounced dead shortly at 12:10 a.m. at the state prison in Bonne Terre. Federal courts and the governor had refused last-minute appeals from his attorneys, who argued that the execution drug purchased from a compounding pharmacy could have caused Taylor inhuman pain and suffering.

Taylor offered no final statement. He mouthed silent words to his parents, two clergymen and other relatives who witnessed his death. As the process began, he took two deep breaths before closing his eyes for the last time. There were no obvious signs of distress.

St. Louis Public Radio posts, "Missouri Executes Second Inmate This Year - First With New Drug Source," by Chris McDaniel.  It's via KBIA-FM.

Taylor was the first Missouri inmate to be executed with a drug made by the state's new (and secret) compounding pharmacy. The previous one bowed out after facing a lawsuit once its identity got out.

Taylor's attorneys argued the supplier was changed at the last minute, taking away any opportunity for oversight. 

"Utterly nothing is known about this pharmacy," his lawyers argued. "Has it been cited for violating federal and state laws more or less often than the previous pharmacy?"

The previous supplier was not licensed to sell in this state. It had also been cited in the past by its own state Board of Pharmacy.

Unlike previous executions, the state did not provide a testing report on the purity and potency of the drug, but said the said the execution would be "rapid" and "painless."

Compounding pharmacies aren't like drug manufacturers. Drug manufacturers are regulated by the Food and Drug Administration, while compounding pharmacies are not. Manufactured drugs have a high assurance that the drugs are of a certain quality, while compounding pharmacies' products have a much higher failure rate.

"Michael Taylor executed by Missouri using compounded pentobarbital," is the Guardian report.

In their appeal Taylor’s attorneys questioned Missouri’s use of an unnamed compounding pharmacy to provide pentobarbital. They also cited concerns about the state executing inmates before appeals were complete and argued that Taylor’s original trial attorney was so overworked that she encouraged him to plead guilty.

The Oklahoma-based compounding pharmacy Apothecary Shoppe agreed last week that it would not supply the pentobarbital for Taylor’s execution, which left Missouri to find a new supplier. The attorney general, Chris Koster, later disclosed that a new provider had been found but refused to name the pharmacy, citing the state’s execution protocol that allows for the manufacturer to remain anonymous.

Taylor’s attorneys argued use of the drug from an unspecified source could cause an inmate pain and suffering because no one could check if the maker was legitimate and had a record of producing safe drugs.

The official makers of pentobarbital refuse to sell it for executions.

"Killer of Missouri schoolgirl executed after appeals dismissed," is by Carey Gillam of Reuters.  It's via the Chicago Tribune.

Before his execution, Taylor told Reuters that he had great remorse for his crime and said it was fueled by crack cocaine.

"I hurt for her family... No words can express the pain and anguish that they have lived with through the years. I can only wish them peace, and pray there will come a day when they can forgive me," Taylor said.

And:

Taylor's family had sought for his death sentence to be converted to life in prison.

"It may be a small victory for the State of Missouri but Michael has won in the end," Taylor's family said in a statement.

"He has struggled for years with the guilt of not stopping a horrendous crime, and has dedicated much of his time in prison to the memory of Ann Harrison through his work with hospice, tutoring and mentoring inside and outside the prison walls," the statement said.

It was the ninth execution in an American death penalty state this year; the 1,368th post-Furman execution since 1977.  It was Missouri's second execution this year, and it 72nd in the modern era.

Earlier coverage from Missouri begins at the link.

ABA Journal Looks at State Secrecy in LI Drug Supply

"States keep mum on where lethal injection drugs are made," is an excellent overview by Wendy N. Davis in the March issue of ABA Journal.  Here's the beginning, which starts in Missouri:

Like other states with the death penalty, Missouri is facing a shortage of the lethal injection drug pentobarbital, primarily because its Danish manufacturer won’t allow it to be used in executions.

So when the state initially set an execution date for convicted serial killer Joseph Paul Franklin, officials announced that they would instead inject Franklin with a lethal dose of propofol, the same anesthetic that killed Michael Jackson.

But after the European Union threatened to limit shipments of propofol to the United States, as a protest against capital punishment, Gov. Jay Nixon had to order the state Department of Corrections to devise a different method of execution. A few weeks later, the state decided to use pentobarbital after all, and to obtain it from a compounding pharmacy, a company that manufactures the drug but without the same level of federal oversight as big manufacturers.

Earlier coverage from Missouri begins with the preceding link.  Also available, more on international pressure; related posts are in the lethal injection category index.

Federal Judge Denies Stay of Execution in Missouri

"Missouri readies for 4th execution in months," is the updated AP report, via the Colubia Missourian.

Missouri corrections officials say they will use a lethal drug provided by a new supplier in the state's fourth execution in four months.

Convicted killer Michael Taylor is scheduled to die at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday. Several court appeals have been filed seeking to spare his life, and Gov. Jay Nixon is weighing a clemency request.

Taylor's attorneys are questioning Missouri's use of the new, unnamed compounding pharmacy to provide the pentobarbital for his execution. They also allege that the state executes men before appeals are complete, and say Taylor's trial attorney was ineffective.

"Judge denies stay of execution for Michael Taylor, killer of KC teen Ann Harrison," is by Tony Rizzo for the Kansas City Star.

A federal judge on Monday denied four motions for a stay of execution filed by a convicted Kansas City killer who is scheduled to be put to death early Wednesday.

The motions filed on behalf of Michael Taylor raised four different issues that defense attorneys said merited a halt to the execution. Taylor is scheduled to die by lethal injection at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday for the 1989 kidnapping, rape and murder of 15-year-old Ann Harrison.

Attorneys for Taylor immediately filed notice Monday morning that they will appeal the rulings to the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Later Monday afternoon, they filed a new request with the 8th Circuit for a stay of execution.

Taylor’s lawyers then filed another motion for a stay of execution with the Missouri Supreme Court. The attorneys said that stay request should be granted because Taylor has a pending motion asking the U.S. Supreme Court to consider his case.

St. Louis Public Radio posts, "Despite New Pharmacy, Federal Judge Denies Stay Of Execution For Missouri Inmate," by Chris McDaniel.  It's via KBIA-FM.  There is audio at the link.

A federal judge has said Wednesday's execution may proceed.

District Judge Beth Phillips denied Missouri inmate Michael Taylor's requests for stays of execution early Monday morning. Her ruling has been appealed to a higher court.

"Teen's killer presses appeals as Missouri prepares his execution," is by Carey Gillam of Reuters.

Missouri officials on Tuesday were fending off a flurry of late appeals from convicted killer Michael Taylor as they prepared for his execution by lethal injection shortly after midnight.

Under the state protocol, 47-year-old Taylor will receive his last meal and be dressed in simple gray pants and a T-shirt and socks before being escorted to the death chamber.

The execution would mark Missouri's 72nd since 1976 and the second this year. State officials are under fire for executing other inmates before their last appeals are exhausted.

Additional coverage includes:

MissouriNet posts, "State hopes to execute Michael Taylor," by Bob Priddy.  There is audio at the link.

"Judge Denies Stay of Execution in Missouri Lethal Injection," by Tracy Connor of NBC News.

"Federal judge denies Missouri death row inmate's appeal over drug," by UPI.

Earlier coverage from Missouri begins at the link.

Louisiana LI News

The Lens of New Orleans posts, "State wants source of new lethal injection drugs to be kept secret from public," by Della Hassell.

Less than two weeks after a federal judge allowed a Louisiana death-row inmate to find out more information about new drugs the state wants to use to kill him, the state has asked that some of that information be kept secret from the public.

On Feb. 3, convicted child-killer Christopher Sepulvado was granted a 90-day delay in execution, just two days before he was set to be killed with a controversial new mix of drugs.

And:

Brady scheduled a hearing for April regarding the constitutionality of the drug combination. The state recently asked that the information regarding the provider of the drugs be kept under seal.

Further, the state wants to limit its disclosures on some information to just the current case, not its general protocol. That includes the source of the drug, the lot number, the identities of people involved in testing chemicals and any other healthcare professionals involved in execution.

The public would be denied information about who makes and tests the drugs and where the Department of Corrections obtained them.

The motion claims that if the information were made public, those involved could suffer from harassment, loss of business and other “adverse consequences.” Further, it reads, “The disclosure … would effectively prevent DOC from obtaining the drugs in order to meet its obligations under state law to carry out death sentences.

Earlier coverage of Louisiana lethal injection issues begins at the link.

The Ghost of Herbert Smulls Haunts Missouri's Death Penalty Plans

That's the title of Andrew Cohen's latest at the Atlantic.  It's subtitled, "It's been just three weeks since Missouri executed Herbert Smulls before his appeals were exhausted. And virtually nothing has gone right for the state in its efforts to implement the death penalty since."

Missouri's problems started almost immediately after Smulls was executed on January 29. On January 30, the Associated Press published a story titled: "Lawyers: Mo. Moving Too Quickly on Executions" in which it was disclosed, for the first time to a national audience, that state officials were executing prisoners before their appeals were exhausted. On February 1, we posted a piece here at The Atlantic titled: "Missouri Executed This Man While His Appeals Was Pending in Court," in which we published emails from Smulls' attorneys to Missouri officials showing that the state was aware that Smulls' appeal was pending at the Supreme Court at the very moment he was being injected with lethal drugs.

Clearly, the justices in Washington were paying close attention to what Missouri had done (killed Smulls) and not done (waited for the justices to tell them they could). On February 3, five days after Smulls' execution, the Clerk of the Court wrote to Missouri officials directing them to file a second response to a petition for certiorari that had been filed on behalf of Smulls and several other death row inmates (who are still alive). The request demonstrated, at the least, that the Court did not consider Smulls' final appeal to be frivolous. Here is the link to that letter. Missouri's response is due March 5. I am curious to know whether state officials reveal any regret for the timing of the Smulls' execution.

Earlier coverage from Missouri begins at the link.

Deadlocked: The Sad State of Georgia's Death Penalty

That's the title of a four-part series on capital punishment in the latest issue of Creative Loafing Atlanta.

On Monday, the Georgia Supreme Court heard arguments in the case that has effectively brought the state's death penalty to a halt.

In July, state corrections officials turned off the lights of the death chamber at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison in Jackson, Ga., roughly 60 miles southeast of Atlanta. Eighty-nine men and one woman there await execution. The freeze wasn't because of faulty equipment or a change of heart by Georgia politicians to bring an end to centuries of executions. It was because the state, in its urgency to keep the death penalty a-hummin', got sloppy trying to kill Warren Lee Hill, who was found guilty in 1991 for his second murder and sentenced to death by lethal injection. Last summer, Hill's lawyers called out state officials for trying to keep secret basic information about the execution process, such as the origin of the drugs that would be used to kill their client. Hill thought he had a right to question the process. But legal debate remained over whether the inmate could challenge his execution because his attorneys and others considered him "mentally retarded" and therefore exempt from the death penalty. Since then, Hill's case has been sitting in legal limbo.

The individual articles are:

"A short history of Georgia's death penalty; Hangings, electrocution, and lethal injections - and the slow change in attitude about executions," by Thomas Wheatley.

"Georgia's long-standing lethal injection controversy; Thirteen years ago, Georgia stopped killing prisoners via the electric chair. But its continued use of deadly drugs hasn't gone so well," by Daniel Beauregard.

"Warren Hill and the future of Georgia's death penalty," by Max Blau.

"Death row's insurmountable burden of proof; For Georgia's death-row inmates, convincing the state of mental disability can be nearly impossible," by Stefan Turkheimer.

Earlier coverage from Georgia begins at the link.

Missouri Says It Has New Source for LI Drug

The Missouri court filing is available through St. Louis Public Radio.  "Missouri Has A New Execution Drug Supplier," is by Chris McDaniel.

Although the state's previous drug supplier says it will not supply for the next execution, Missouri says it's found another willing pharmacy.

On Monday, the Apothecary Shoppe in Oklahoma reached a settlement with an inmate who had sued the pharmacy. Although the terms were confidential, the pharmacy agreed to not sell to Missouri for its upcoming execution.

In a court filing Wednesday evening, the state said inmate Michael Taylor was trying to cut off the supply of the state's execution drug.

"But Taylor has failed," assistant Attorney General Michael Spillane wrote. "[We] do not admit nor deny the pharmacy Taylor threatened, then sued, has supplied pentobarbital to Missouri. However, Missouri has now arranged with a pharmacy, that is not the pharmacy Taylor threatened and sued, to supply pentobarbital for Taylor’s execution."

"Missouri says it has a drug supplier for its upcoming execution," is by Tony Rizzo for the Kansas City Star.

Missouri officials said late Wednesday afternoon that they have arranged with an unidentified pharmacy to provide the lethal injection chemical for use in next week’s execution of a Kansas City man.

The state revealed the existence of the supplier of pentobarbital — the drug used in the state’s last three executions — in a federal court filing opposing a stay of execution for Michael Taylor.

Taylor is scheduled to be put to death next Wednesday for the 1989 killing of 15-year-old Ann Harrison.

Wednesday’s court filing does not specify when the state made arrangements with the pharmacy.

NBC News posts, "Missouri: We Found Another Pharmacy to Supply Execution Drugs," by Tracy Connor.

Two days after one compounding pharmacy said it would not sell the drug needed for a Missouri execution, state officials revealed in court papers Wednesday that they have found another supplier for the lethal injection.

Convicted child-killer Michael Taylor applied for a stay of execution after the Apothecary Shoppe in Tulsa, Okla., settled a lawsuit by agreeing not to be the source of pentobarbital or any other chemicals for his scheduled Feb. 26 execution.

His lawyers argued that Missouri should not be allowed to use a backup method — the sedative midazolam and painkiller hydromorphone — because an Ohio execution that relied on the cocktail led to an unusually prolonged death.

Also, AP reports, "Mo. bill would give flexibility on executions," by Jordan Shapiro.  It's via the Southesast Missourian.

A state senator proposed Wednesday to give Missouri prison officials more choices in deciding how they want to execute inmates, as the state is facing increasing scrutiny for its current lethal injection methods.

Sen. Kurt Schaefer introduced legislation that would give the department full discretion in deciding how to put inmates to death. Current state law only permits executions by lethal gas or chemicals. The state doesn't have a functioning gas chamber, leaving lethal injection as the only execution method.

"I don't care what they use," said Schaefer, R-Columbia, and a former prosecutor.

Lethal injections, gas, electrocutions, hanging and firing squads are allowed under U.S. law, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

The measure was introduced on the same day the head of the Corrections Department declined to tell the Senate Appropriations Committee, which Schaefer chairs, whether the state had enough of its execution drug to carry out next week's lethal injection.

And:

While Schaefer's solution would give prison officials greater control over executions, other proposals would give lawmakers more power.

Senate Minority Leader Jolie Justus, D-Kansas City, has introduced legislation to halt executions in Missouri until a special commission can create new procedures. The panel's recommendation would then be subject to legislative oversight.

Earlier coverage from Missouri begins at the link.

The Latest From Missouri

Today's St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports, "Missouri says it's ready to execute murderer – the question is how," by Jeremy Kohler.

The Missouri Department of Corrections said Tuesday that it planned to go ahead with the execution of Michael A. Taylor on Feb. 26, even though its access was cut off to a sedative it had planned to use for the lethal injection.

The unanswered question was how.

An Oklahoma pharmacy agreed Monday not to provide Missouri corrections officials with pentobarbital and acknowledged it had not already provided the drug for the execution. Taylor had sued the pharmacy after attorneys and other death penalty opponents had publicly named the pharmacy as the source of Missouri’s execution drug.

Taylor’s attorneys said in documents filed in federal court that they believed the state had no pentobarbital. But on Tuesday, a spokesman for the Department of Corrections said in an email that Missouri was “prepared to carry out the execution … following the established execution protocol” using pentobarbital.

He would not say directly whether the state had the drug on hand.

"Missouri officials declined comment on execution supply," is the AP report, via the Springfield News-Leader.

The head of the Missouri Corrections Department is remaining silent on whether the state has enough of its execution drug to carry out next week’s scheduled lethal injection.

Director George Lombardi told the Senate Appropriations Committee on Wednesday that he couldn’t comment on the state’s drug supply. But he did say the state cannot stockpile pentobarbital produced by a compounding pharmacy because of its shelf life.

"Missouri execution of Michael Taylor remains on track, governor says," is the Kansas City Star report by Tony Rizzo and Jason Hancock.

“We will be prepared to move forward with the necessary responsibility to effectuate the ultimate penalty next week,” the governor said.

In their motion for a stay, attorneys for Taylor said any pentobarbital the state previously had stockpiled now would be expired.

And reports that the state may have alternative lethal injection chemicals on hand, if true, would leave Taylor little time to mount a legal challenge, his attorneys argued.

While being questioned during a recent deposition, a Missouri corrections official testified that the state had obtained the drugs midazolam and hydromorphone as a “backup” for use in executions.

But the state’s written lethal injection protocol only specifies the use of pentobarbital. In a written statement released Tuesday afternoon, the Department of Corrections said it was prepared to carry out the execution “following the established execution protocol.”

St. Louis Public Radio posts, "Another Federal Judge Criticizes Missouri For Haste In Carrying Out Executions," by Chris McDaniel.  There is audio at the link.

Missouri's recent executions have sparked controversy lately -- not just for the secrecy and the source of the execution drug but also for the state's speed in carrying them out.

The Department of Corrections has carried out three executions in as many months. In all those cases, the inmate still had appeals pending at the time the state executed him.

It's something legal experts have expressed concern and alarm over. Last week, 8th Circuit Chief Judge William Riley admonished the state for its actions.

"The state of Missouri executed somebody -- which they probably had the right to do -- right in the middle of the petition for rehearing voting," Riley said to Missouri Assistant Attorney General Stephen Hawke. "And I wanted you take back the word [to the attorney general's office] that some of the members did not appreciate that. We were right in the middle of voting on that."

Hawke was appearing before the court in an unrelated case.

Additional coverage includes:

"US state says execution to continue as drug supplier backs out," by AFP.

Courthouse News Service posts, "Drug Questions Won't Derail Missouri Execution," by Joe Harris.

"Missouri says it's ready to execute Taylor following proper protocol," by UPI.

"Missouri scrambles for execution drugs after pharmacy cuts off supply," by Ed Pilkington for the Guardian.

"Missouri Denied Execution Drugs By Pharmacy," by Josh Sanburn for Time.

"Pharmacy agrees not to provide execution drugs," by Meredith Clark of MSNBC.

Reuters posts, "Oklahoma pharmacy agrees not to supply drug for Missouri execution," by Carey Gillam.

"Missouri Execution Stalled Over Lethal Drugs In Short Supply," by Laura Sullivan on yesterday's edition of NPR's All Things Considered.  There is audio and a transcript at the link.

The NPR and WBUR produced, Here & Now interviews St. Louis Public Radio reporter Chris McDaniel, who has done much of the enterprise reporting on th issue in, "Oklahoma Pharmacy Says No To Providing Execution Drug."  Again, there is audio at the link.

"A death penalty dilemma for Missouri as drug supplier backs out," is by Scott Martelle at the Los Angeles Times' Opinion LA blog.

"Missouri Fights to Execute Michael Taylor, Who Is Suing the Maker of Lethal Drug," is by Nick Chiles for Atlanta Black Star.

Earlier coverage of the pending Missouri execution begins at the link.

Lethal Injection Drugs

"Can Europe End the Death Penalty in America?" is by Matt Ford at the Atlantic.

Lethal injection is by far the predominant method of execution in the United States. Before the drug shortage, virtually every lethal-injection protocol used the same three-drug method. A first drug, sodium thiopental, anesthetized the prisoner. Then a second drug, pancuronium bromide, paralyzed the inmate and halted his or her breathing. Finally, an injection of potassium chloride stopped the heart. Jay Chapman, an Oklahoma medical examiner with little pharmacology experience, first proposed the three-drug protocol in 1977. Asked about his qualifications by a New York Times reporter 30 years later, Chapman described himself as “an expert in matters after death but not in getting people that way.”

Texas became the first state to use lethal injection when it executed Charles Brooks, Jr. on December 7, 1982. Since then, U.S. states have executed over 1,000 death-row inmates by lethal injection. By the time the three-drug cocktail's constitutionality came before the U.S. Supreme Court in 2008 in Baze v. Rees, lethal injection had become the preferred method of execution for 36 states and the federal government. Thirty of those states used Chapman’s method. The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the three-drug protocol in a 7-2 decision.

The European Union, for its part, makes no secret of its death-penalty stance. EU guidelines call for its “universal abolition” and declare that doing so would “[contribute] to the enhancement of human dignity and the progressive development of human rights.” EU diplomats and leaders frequently petition U.S. governors and state parole boards to halt forthcoming executions. Sometimes, the supranational organization even works in more subtle ways: EU agencies contributed over $4.8 million in donations to U.S. anti-death-penalty organizations between 2009 and 2013.

NBC News posts, "Death by Lethal Injection Faces New Hurdles," by Tracy Connor.

Until about 2010, most death-penalty states used a three-drug cocktail that was upheld as constitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court: the anesthetic sodium thiopental, the paralytic pancuronium bromide, and heart-stopping potassium chloride to stop the heart, causing death.

In 2011, Hospira, the sole U.S. producer of sodium thiopental, stopped making the drug, and the European manufacturer balked at exporting it to the U.S. if it were to be used in executions.

Manufacturers of substitute drugs like pentobarbital have also refused to supply it for executions, forcing states to turn to compounders, who mix specialty drugs from their basic components.

Defense lawyers argue that's illegal, claiming the lack of oversight prevents jailers from guaranteeing an execution won't be agonizing enough to violate the constitutional protection against cruel and unusual punishment.

They have attacked states' attempts to keep the names of the pharmacies secret — Georgia's highest court is set to decide soon whether it's legal — and it's easy to see why.

"Lethal Injection Drug Shortage Becomes More Acute," is by Jim Salter of Associated Press.  It's via HuffPost.

The nation's shortage of execution drugs is becoming increasingly acute as more pharmacies conclude that supplying the lethal chemicals is not worth the bad publicity and the legal and ethical risks.

The scarcity of drugs for lethal injections has forced states to scramble for substitutes. And experts say that whatever alternatives are found will almost certainly face costly court challenges made more complicated by laws that cloak the process in secrecy.

And:

Lethal injection has faced increasing scrutiny over the past decade. Major drug makers, many of them based in Europe with longtime opposition to the death penalty, have stopped selling to prisons and corrections departments. The source of the drugs is moving to the forefront of the death penalty debate.

Compounding pharmacies — which custom-mix prescription drugs for doctors and patients — seemed like the answer. They are generally overseen by state boards, not the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, although a law adopted last year allows larger compounding pharmacies to register with the FDA and submit to federal inspections.

But now, some compounding pharmacies are starting to back away, too.

Experts say they're not surprised, given the limited profit in selling execution drugs, ethical concerns in the medical profession, potential legal costs and unwanted publicity.

"This is not a good business model for compounding pharmacies, to be making drugs for executions, particularly with all the secret ways they're doing it," Fordam Law School professor Deborah Denno said.

Earlier coverage of international pressures and restrictions by pharmaceutical makers, at the link.

Related posts are in the international and lethal injection category indexes.

News Coverage of Georgia Supreme Court Hearing

"State’s lethal-injection secrecy law challenged," is by Bill Rankin for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

The state’s highest court on Monday gave no clear indication whether it will decide the constitutionality of a new Georgia law that keeps secret that identities makers and suppliers of Georgia’s lethal-injection drugs.

But a number of the court’s justices expressed concern that the law’s secrecy may prevent a condemned inmate from determining if he faced an execution that could subject him to cruel and unusual punishment.

“For something as critical as life itself, the state is just saying, ‘Trust us, we’ll do the right thing,’” Justice Robert Benham said during the arguments.

The case involves an appeal by the state from an order issued last July by Fulton Superior Court Judge Gail Tusan, who found the law was likely unconstitutional. In her ruling, Tusan halted the execution of Warren Hill so she could more closely examine the secrecy law. The Supreme Court’s ruling, expected in the coming months, will decide whether Tusan gets to conduct that review.

AP coverage is, "Georgia justices hear arguments in death penalty case," by Kate Brumback, via the Augusta Chronicle.

Lawyers for the state and for a Georgia death row inmate sparred Mon­day over whether prisoners awaiting execution should have access to information about where the state gets its death penalty drug.

In July, Fulton County Su­perior Court Judge Gail Tusan issued a stay of execution for Warren Lee Hill after his attorneys challenged the constitutionality of a new state law that classifies certain information about executions, including the source of the drug, as a “confidential state secret.”

Lawyers for the state appealed Tusan’s order to the Geor­gia Supreme Court, which heard oral arguments Monday.

Sabrina Graham, of the state attorney general’s office, asked the high court to rule that Tusan didn’t have the authority to halt the execution and find the law constitutional.

Manoj Varghese, a lawyer for Hill, said the stay was appropriate and that death row inmates need to have information about where the execution drug comes from so they can challenge it if they believe it could cause unnecessary suffering.

"Attorneys Ask Georgia Supreme Court to Strike Down Execution Drug Secrecy Law," is by Lisa George for WABE-FM.  There is audio at the link.

Lawyers for death row inmate Warren Lee Hill, Junior, went before the Supreme Court of Georgia today trying to get the state’s secrecy law about its execution drug ruled unconstitutional.

The law lets state officials withhold all information about the source of the execution drug it plans to use. Hill’s lawyers say they need information to decide whether to mount a claim that the drug might cause needless suffering. The Attorney General’s office argues that the secrecy laws protect the pharmacies.

Presiding Justice P. Harris Hines asked if knowing some information might help, such as state the drug came from, because of Georgia’s history of using compounding pharmacies which are not federally regulated.

Defense attorney Sachin Varghese responded, “This court could certainly find that withholding information from the judiciary is unconstitutional. And that’s precisely the fundamental problem with this statute: is it prevents the judiciary from closely scrutinizing the death penalty in the state of Georgia."

Creative Loafing Atlanta posts, "Georgia's Supreme Court hears oral arguments in Warren Hill appeal," by Max Blau.

Assistant Attorney General Sabrina Graham defended the state's lethal-injection secrecy law's constitutionality. She argued the measure hadn't limited Hill's ability to mount a legal defense in court. The state law, which Gold Dome lawmakers passed last year, allows state officials to conceal details about where Department of Corrections officials obtain execution drugs.

Hill attorney Sachin Varghese called for greater transparency related to how the state conducts its executions. In his client's case, the lack of knowledge regarding who or where the state's lethal-injection supplies comes from makes it difficult to assess if Hill's Eighth Amendment rights, which protect him from cruel and unusual punishment, were violated. If drugs are improperly administered, he argued, the death-row inmate could be subjected to unnecessary suffering in what's supposed to be a relatively painless process.

In addition, both sides debated the importance of compounding pharmacies - labs that create their own drugs and are often unregulated by the Federal Drug Administration - to the current appeal. Varghese argued that the varying degree of state regulations for such pharmacies made it difficult to know the full details needed for a proper legal defense. On the other hand, Graham said no proper case had been made regarding possible cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment.

Earlier coverage of the Georgia case begins at the link.

Apothecary Shoppe Will Not Supply LI Drugs to Missouri

"Okla. pharmacy won't give drug for Mo. execution," is the AP report by Tim Talley and Justin Juozapavicius.  It's also available from ABC News.

An Oklahoma pharmacy will not provide a drug for a scheduled execution next week in Missouri as part of a settlement with the death row inmate's attorneys. But it's unclear whether the agreement will prevent or delay the lethal injection.

A court hearing is scheduled Tuesday in the federal lawsuit filed by inmate Michael Taylor against The Apothecary Shoppe, a compounding pharmacy in Tulsa that his attorneys said was providing a drug that could cause "inhumane pain" during his Feb. 26 execution.

In court documents filed late Monday, his lawyers asked a judge to dismiss the case because the company had agreed not to prepare or provide any drug for use in Taylor's lethal injection. The pharmacy also acknowledged it had not already provided any drug to the Missouri Department of Corrections for the execution, said Taylor's attorney, Matt Hellman.

However, Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon indicated last week that the state could move forward with the execution even after the judge issued a temporary restraining order that blocked the company from providing the drug. He did not directly say "yes" or "no" when asked if Missouri had enough drugs for the execution, but he twice stressed that the Department of Corrections was prepared.

A slightly different version of the report is posted at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

According to the documents, the Apothecary Shoppe, of Tulsa, will not prepare or provide pentobarbital or any other drug for use in Michael Taylor’s execution. The documents ask a judge to dismiss the case that Taylor’s lawyers had filed against the pharmacy seeking to stop it from providing the execution drug. A hearing is scheduled for today.

Taylor’s attorney, Matt Hellman, said that as part of the deal, the pharmacy acknowledged it has not already provided any such drug to the Missouri Department of Corrections for the execution, which is scheduled for Feb. 26.

St. Louis Public Radio posts, "Oklahoma Pharmacy Agrees Not To Sell Execution Drug To Missouri," by Chris McDaniel.

Last week, a federal judge ordered the pharmacy to hold off on selling the drug to Missouri until further review. Before that could take place, however, the pharmacy and the inmate came to an agreement.

"The Apothecary Shoppe has agreed that it will not prepare or provide pentobarbital or any other drug for use in the execution of Michael Taylor," Carrie Apfel, Taylor's attorney, said in a written statement. She also said the pharmacy had not sold any drugs to the Department of Corrections for this execution yet.

The Apothecary Shoppe could not be reached for comment.

We reported in December that Missouri had been obtaining its execution drug from a compounding pharmacy not licensed to sell here. The Apothecary Shoppe sold the state compounded pentobarbital for three executions, but it only recently became licensed with the Missouri Board of Pharmacy. A Corrections official had been taking thousands of dollars in cash to the Tulsa pharmacy.

"Oklahoma pharmacy capitulates, won't supply Missouri with execution drug," is by Steve Vockrodt for the Pitch of Kansas City.

On the eve of a court hearing in Oklahoma, on whether to prolong an injunction against the pharmacy from supplying Missouri with pentobarbital, the Apothecary Shoppe reached a deal with Michael Taylor's attorneys to not make the drug for his upcoming execution. Taylor's attorneys succeeded last week in getting a temporary restraining order against the pharmacy's supply chain to the Missouri Department of Corrections while federal courts sorted out the issues surrounding Missouri's death-penalty protocol.

Missouri has made headlines around the country in recent months for its cat-and-mouse execution methods. The state either changes the drugs it uses or cloaks its drug supplier under a broad interpretation of state law that keeps members of its execution team secret. The Apothecary Shoppe did its business with Missouri in secret until The Pitch identified the compounding pharmacy in Tulsa as the likely supplier in January.

At issue is whether Missouri properly obtains its drug and whether it can definitively vouch for the efficacy of that drug. But Missouri's insistence on secrecy as well as troubling revelations about how it gets the drug have cast doubt on the state's promises that it's doing its executions appropriately.

"Missouri execution: pharmacy will not supply compounded pentobarbital," is at the Guardian.

The Apothecary Shoppe has not acknowledged that it supplies a compounded version of pentobarbital to Missouri for use in lethal injections, as Taylor says, and says it can’t because of a Missouri law requiring the identities of those on the state’s execution team to be kept confidential.

In his lawsuit Taylor alleged that Missouri turned to the Apothecary Shoppe to supply compounded pentobarbital because the only licensed manufacturer of the drug refuses to provide it for lethal injections. That company, Illinois-based Akorn Inc, agreed to that condition when it bought the exclusive rights to the drug in January 2012 from a Danish company that had produced it under the trade name Nembutal.
Taylor contends that several recent executions in which compounded pentobarbital was used showed it would likely cause him “severe, unnecessary, lingering and ultimately inhumane pain”.

Earlier coverage from Missouri begins at the link.

More From Missouri

"Lethal injection questions could delay killer's execution again," is the St. Louis Post-Dispatch report by Jeremy Kohler.

Michael A. Taylor has been here before.

The state of Missouri was hours away from taking his life in June 2006 for the abduction, rape and murder of 15-year-old Ann Harrison in Kansas City.

But Taylor’s lawyers raised questions about whether Missouri’s three-drug lethal injection protocol would pass constitutional muster. Their inquiry led to a blockbuster disclosure: The state’s lead executioner testified that he was dyslexic and sometimes mixed up drug amounts. His testimony raised questions about whether the state’s execution protocol put Taylor at risk of suffering a cruel and unusual punishment.

A federal judge put a moratorium on Missouri’s death penalty.

Years later, Missouri uses a single drug, pentobarbital. The state has used it to execute three inmates since November. Taylor is next in line for the injection, scheduled for Feb. 26. But once again, questions from Taylor’s lawyers about Missouri’s execution protocol threaten to keep the state from seeking justice.

The Post-Dispatch also publishes, "Frequently asked questions about Missouri's death penalty," by Kohler.

Earlier coverage of Missouri lethal injection issues begins at the link.

In Georgia

"Georgia’s high court to take look at lethal-injection secrecy law," is Bill Rankin's report in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Georgia cannot carry out executions without a new law that shields from public view the identities of those who make and supply lethal-injection drugs to prison officials, state officials say.

But it is a legal challenge to the secrecy law, which took effect last year, that has ground executions here to a halt.

In July, Fulton County Superior Court Judge Gail Tusan ruled that the new statute was likely unconstitutional and stayed the execution of condemned killer Warren Hill. Since then, the state has scheduled no other executions.

Monday, the Georgia Supreme Court will hear arguments in Hill’s case and could ultimately determine whether Georgia’s lethal-injection secrecy law is constitutional. The court could avoid the issue altogether and decide whether Tusan had the authority to issue the stay. But the state Attorney General’s Office is asking the justices to address the issue head-on because it is “almost certain” a challenge to the law will be back before the court again.

The court is hearing the case at a time when prison officials in Georgia and across the nation are scrambling to obtain drugs that allow them to carry out executions. Just last week, Wyoming lawmakers considered but rejected the use of firing squads to execute condemned inmates, and Virginia legislators shelved consideration of bringing back the electric chair. The proposals were being considered because of the scarcity of lethal-injection drugs.

"High court to hear oral arguments in Hill case," is the AP preview filed by Kate Brumback.  It's via the Marietta Daily Journal.

The Georgia Supreme Court is set to hear oral arguments today in its review of a lower court’s order temporarily halting an execution because of a challenge to a new state law prohibiting the release of information about the source of the state’s execution drug.

Fulton County Superior Court Judge Gail Tusan in July issued a stay of execution for Warren Lee Hill. At issue is a law that classifies certain information about executions, including the source of the drug, as a “confidential state secret.”

Hill’s lawyers say the statute is unconstitutional. State attorneys have said the law is constitutional and necessary to discourage retaliation against those who take part in executions.

The high court has asked the two sides to address four questions:

• Is the case moot because the state’s supply of execution drug pentobarbital has expired and it is unclear where the state would get more?
• Did the Fulton County Superior Court have the authority to halt Hill’s execution?
• Could the issue of the law’s constitutionality be avoided if Hill were given a sample of the drug for testing or if he were given other information not prohibited by the law?
• Did Tusan make a mistake when she stopped the execution based on Hill’s challenge of the law’s constitutionality?

Earlier coverage of Georgia lethal injection issues begins at the link; also available,  coverage of Warren Hill's case.  Related posts are in the lethal injection category index.

Warren Hill's stay of execution grows from his lawyers' challenge to the Georgia law restricting information on the state's lethal injection drugs.  Georgia's standard for determining mental retardation (now generally referred to as intellectual disability) is also an issue in his case.

Missouri Governor Says State Is Ready for Next Execution

"Nixon says state is prepared for next execution," is the AP report, via KRCG-TV

Gov. Jay Nixon says Missouri is prepared to go ahead with a scheduled execution despite a judicial order blocking an Oklahoma business from supplying a lethal injection drug to Missouri.

Nixon was asked Thursday whether Missouri already has enough pentobarbital to carry out the Feb. 26 execution of Michael Taylor. He did not directly say "yes" or "no," but twice stressed that the Department of Corrections is prepared for the execution.

A federal judge in Oklahoma issued a temporary restraining order Wednesday blocking an Oklahoma pharmacy from supplying the execution drug to Missouri's corrections department.

AP also reports, "Suit Over Missouri Execution Drug Draws Scrutiny," by David Lieb, with contributions from  AP journalists in other states.  It's via Pharmaceutical Processing.

A ruling temporarily prohibiting a compounding pharmacy from selling execution drugs to Missouri could have implications across the country, a legal expert said Thursday.

U.S. District Judge Terence Kern in Tulsa, Okla., issued a temporary restraining order Wednesday in a suit filed on behalf of condemned Missouri inmate Michael Taylor. The ruling prohibits Tulsa-based Apothecary Shoppe from selling pentobarbital to the Missouri Department of Corrections. A hearing on the case is next week.

And:

Fordham Law School professor Deborah Denno said those on both sides of the death penalty debate are watching developments in the lawsuit.

"I think this is going to spur attorneys in other states to file similar kinds of claims," Denno said. She also questioned whether legal concerns and bad publicity could compel compounding pharmacies to opt out of making and selling execution drugs.

"You really wonder why a compounding pharmacy would get involved," Denno said. "It's not a lucrative market, and it's a market that can really hurt you in terms of your reputation."

Earlier coverage from Missouri begins at the link.  Related posts are in the lethal injection category index.