New Documents Reveal Texas Has Spent More Than $775,000 on Lethal Injection Drugs Since October 2024 — But Many Other Details Remain Secret

Documents reviewed by NBC News in response to a pub­lic records request reveal that since October 2024 Texas has spent more than $775,000 to acquire pen­to­bar­bi­tal, the drug used in the state’s lethal injec­tion exe­cu­tion pro­to­col. During the same time frame, the state has car­ried out 6 exe­cu­tions. The records show that in September 2024, the state obtained 20 one-gram vials of pen­to­bar­bi­tal and an addi­tion­al eight 2.5‑gram vials in February 2025. Per the state’s pro­to­col, these amounts are enough to car­ry out up to eight exe­cu­tions. The state’s secre­cy statute pre­vents the pub­lic from learn­ing infor­ma­tion relat­ed to the drug man­u­fac­tur­er, so redac­tions to the records made by state offi­cials meant the records showed no break­down of costs or infor­ma­tion about the source of the pentobarbital. 

Since 2010, every state that has con­duct­ed an exe­cu­tion has enact­ed secre­cy laws or poli­cies that pro­hib­it the pub­lic release of infor­ma­tion regard­ing aspects of the exe­cu­tion process. Secrecy laws hide many crit­i­cal details, includ­ing the source of exe­cu­tion drugs and the iden­ti­ties, qual­i­fi­ca­tions, and train­ing of exe­cu­tion team mem­bers. Lawmakers argue that these laws pro­tect the safe­ty of those involved in exe­cu­tions; how­ev­er, researchers have nev­er found any evi­dence of cred­i­ble threats to any­one asso­ci­at­ed with an execution. 

Secrecy prac­tices began after increased scruti­ny of exe­cu­tion prac­tices in the late 2000s, when many phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­nies refused to sell their prod­ucts to depart­ments of cor­rec­tions for use in exe­cu­tions in response to reports of botched exe­cu­tions and pub­lic out­cry. Investigative reports doc­u­ment­ed states’ dubi­ous efforts to obtain exe­cu­tion drugs, includ­ing procur­ing drugs from over­seas, and rely­ing on com­pound­ing phar­ma­cies with trou­bling safe­ty and com­pli­ance records. Compounding phar­ma­cies do not face the same reg­u­la­tions and approval process­es for their prod­ucts that large man­u­fac­tur­ers do, which has prompt­ed con­cerns with the use and effi­ca­cy of their prod­ucts. The exper­i­men­ta­tion with dif­fer­ent drugs and com­bi­na­tions led to an increase in botched exe­cu­tions – and more ques­tions. But instead of respond­ing to increased con­cerns, many state offi­cials chose to pro­hib­it the pub­lic release of infor­ma­tion and shroud their deci­sion-mak­ing in secrecy. 

Many phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­nies con­tin­ue to oppose the use of their prod­ucts in exe­cu­tions, some­times lead­ing to law­suits. ​“Executing states are going to great lengths to hide these pur­chas­es from tax­pay­ers and defense attor­neys and the phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­nies whose con­trols they’re vio­lat­ing — and they keep get­ting caught,” said Matt Wells, the deputy direc­tor of Reprieve US. Two com­pa­nies — Hikma and Sagent — man­u­fac­ture pen­to­bar­bi­tal in the US. In a let­ter to Idaho offi­cials in 2024, Sagent offi­cials warned that when ​“prod­ucts are divert­ed from legit­i­mate chan­nels, in vio­la­tion of our dis­tri­b­u­tion con­trols, they risk being coun­ter­feit, stolen, con­t­a­m­i­nat­ed, or oth­er­wise harm­ful.” A Hikma spokesper­son told NBC News that the com­pa­ny sends sim­i­lar let­ters to states every year, as it has for eight years, ​“to firm­ly remind them of our strong objec­tions to the use of our med­i­cines in capital punishment.” 

According to the records obtained by NBC News, Texas’ sup­ply of pen­to­bar­bi­tal includes dos­es with beyond-use dates, indi­cat­ing they are prod­ucts of a com­pound­ing phar­ma­cy, while oth­ers had expi­ra­tion dates, indi­cat­ing they were man­u­fac­tured. The 20 one-gram vials acquired in September 2024 had April 2025 expi­ra­tion dates, and records indi­cate they were used for the exe­cu­tions of Garcia White in 2024, and Steven Nelson, Richard Tabler, and Moises Mendoza in ear­ly 2025. The records indi­cate that the drugs pur­chased in February 2025 expired at the end of October 2025. Some of these vials were used in the exe­cu­tion of Matthew Johnson, but it is unclear if any were used in the exe­cu­tion of Blaine Milam in September 2025. 

Texas was sched­uled to exe­cute Robert Roberson on October 16, 2025, but a week ahead of this date, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals stayed his exe­cu­tion. It is unclear whether or not the almost-expired sup­ply of pen­to­bar­bi­tal was intend­ed for Mr. Roberson’s exe­cu­tion. ​“With the stay of Mr. Roberson’s exe­cu­tion, the man­u­fac­tured drugs we believe to be cur­rent­ly in their pos­ses­sion, which expire at the end of October, have to be trashed,” said Maurie Levin, a Texas cap­i­tal defense attor­ney. Ms. Levin added, “[i]t’s a con­stant game of use it or lose it or extend the ​‘beyond use date’ for the umpteenth time, includ­ing the hun­dreds of thou­sands of dol­lars spent to get it…The expi­ra­tion date of ille­gal­ly pur­chased drugs should hard­ly be the engine dri­ving Texas executions.” 

Other states have also spent large amounts of tax­pay­er dol­lars to acquire pen­to­bar­bi­tal for use in lethal injec­tion exe­cu­tions. In Indiana, Governor Mike Braun dis­closedthat the state has spent $1.175 mil­lion on drug sup­plies over the last two years. Two of the dos­es pur­chased, which cost $600,000, expired with­out being used. The Idaho Department of Corrections (IDOC) spent $200,000 on lethal injec­tion drugs since 2023, all of which expired with­out being used. 

Texas’ next exe­cu­tion is sched­uled for January 28, 2026.