Update: Oklahoma's Criminal Court of Appeals approved a six month stay of execution for a death-row inmate while an investigation into the tortuous death of Clayton Lockett takes place. The state's Attorney General urged that executions be suspended while the investigation is conducted. The governor originally granted Charles Warner a two week stay. Several jurisdictions, both state and federal, are looking into the issues of security, safety and lethality of drugs compounded especially for executions. Since the source of supply was cut off from abroad, the execution machinery in the United States has clanked to almost a complete stop due to drug shortages and forced changes in execution protocols. The difficulties have increased the public profile of executions and opposition to the death penalty on humanitarian grounds.
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| NYT: McAlester Pen |
{01.05.14}Clayton D. Lockett was essentially tortured to death by the state of Oklahoma. It took the man forty-three minutes to die from supposedly lethal injection. He died of a heart attack in the chamber. The so-called execution was insisted upon by a state determined for ideological reasons not reveal the source of its chemical weapons. Recent studies, agonizing inmate deaths, and a cut-off in drug supply from Europe have thrown a wrench into the state apparatus for executions in Amerika. The EU horrified by the barbaric practice that will not die, has refused to provide anymore lethal chemicals to Amerika. Belarus is the only European country that carries out executions--a gunshot to the head. Lockett was the latest case in a history of botched procedures. Apparently an intravenous line or the vein itself failed. But he was declared unconscious by the state's doctor after midazolam, a sedative, was injected on Wednesday evening. Then the executioners proceeded to inject two more drugs, vecuronium bromide and potassium chloride, intended to paralyze and stop the cardiac muscle. But Mr. Lockett regained consciousness and attempted to get up from the gurney in obvious pain. Without total sedation the second drugs are known to cause agonizing suffocation and pain. Because of the horror of Mr. Lockett's death a second inmate scheduled to die was stayed for two weeks. The White House condemned the macabre theater as inhumane. The governor promised an investigation but then assigned the matter to the state's public safety commissioner.
The appeals for disclosures about the drug sources prior to the scheduled executions put the state of Oklahoma into a frenzy. Officials are concerned about security for companies providing the drugs. The governor defied the Supreme Court's stay of the executions while it considered the disclosure controversy. Lawyers for the convicts say without knowing information about the supplier it was impossible to know if the drugs were safe and effective. The state's attorney general called the requests for information a "delaying tactic". A conservative state legislator threatened to impeach the justices for interfering in the planned executions. Both men committed particularly gruesome murders, but revenge, official or otherwise, never justifies a homicide. Both the AMA and the Society of Anesthesiologists say members should not take part in executions.
