In a rul­ing that may put all exe­cu­tions on hold in the state of Kentucky, a Franklin County Circuit Judge held that the state must hold pub­lic hear­ings because it changed the way the state plans to car­ry out exe­cu­tions. A group of death row inmates had chal­lenged the state’s lethal injec­tion pro­to­col in 2004, and sub­se­quent­ly the state altered the mix­ture of drugs used and the way they would be admin­is­tered with­out going through the nec­es­sary admin­is­tra­tive process for such a change. Recently, the Kentucky Supreme Court upheld the con­sti­tu­tion­al­i­ty of the state’s lethal injec­tion process. Kentucky has 40 inmates on death row, but only two inmates have been exe­cut­ed since the death penal­ty was rein­stat­ed in 1976; only one was exe­cut­ed by lethal injection.

(Associated Press, Nov. 29, 2006). UPDATE: On Dec. 27, 2006, the Franklin County judge reversed him­self and held that the lethal injec­tion pro­ce­dures are not sub­ject to pub­lic review under the state’s Administrative Procedures Act. (Bowling, et al. v. KY Dept. of Corr., No. 06-CI-00574, Dec. 27, 2006). See Lethal Injection for devel­op­ments on this issue in other states.

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