---
title: 'Excerpts from Dissent Regarding Secrecy of Lethal Injection Drugs'
description: 'In a dissent from a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit allowing Missouri’s execution of Michael Taylor on February 26, three…'
canonical: 'https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/excerpts-from-dissent-regarding-secrecy-of-lethal-injection-drugs'
section: news
date: '2014-02-27T16:36:20-05:00'
updated: '2025-03-14T14:37:15-04:00'
source: 'Death Penalty Information Center'
---

! In a dissent from a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit allowing **Missouri's** execution of Michael Taylor on February 26, three judges sharply criticized the secrecy of Missouri's lethal injection protocol as a violation of Taylor's right to due process. The dissenters would have stayed the execution to allow Taylor to obtain information about the source of the execution drugs:

- "Because Taylor seeks to determine whether the drug to be used in his execution will result in pain or in a lingering death, it bears repeating the importance of the identities of the pharmacists, laboratories, and drug suppliers in determining whether Missouri's execution of death row inmates is constitutional."

- "\[F\]rom 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."

- "If through lack of experience or lack of time to do adequate testing, the pharmacy has manufactured something which is quite painful, Taylor's constitutional rights would be violated."

- "Missouri has a storied history of ignoring death row inmates' constitutional rights to federal review of their executions. I once again fear Missouri elevates the ends over the means in its rush to execute Taylor."

- "Nothing Taylor asks for would place an undue burden on Missouri. He simply seeks transparency concerning the manufacturer of the chemical used to execute a death sentence and testing of the chemical for identity, potency, purity, and contamination. Considering the enormity of the issues at stake, this is a burden which is entirely due."
- "Missouri has again, at the eleventh hour, amended its procedure and again is 'using \[a\] shadow pharmac\[y\] hidden behind the hangman's hood' and 'copycat pharmaceuticals' to execute another death row inmate." (citations omitted).

([Zink, et al. v. Lombardi, et al., No. 14-1388](https://cdn.craft.cloud/c08a8cf8-1de1-4da0-8525-321ca2c16992/assets/legacy/MichaelTaylorDissent.pdf) (8th Cir., Feb. 25, 2014) (Bye, J., dissenting, joined by JJ. Kelly and Murphy). See **[Lethal Injection](/lethal-injection)** and [**Arbitrariness**](/arbitrariness).