A new sci­en­tif­ic study of 41 lethal injec­tions that took place in California and North Carolina dur­ing the past two decades revealed that two of the three drugs used to car­ry out these exe­cu­tions are not admin­is­tered in a way that reli­ably pro­duces death in the way intend­ed. The study, pub­lished in the Public Library of Science Journal, PLoS Medicine, found that inmates were giv­en a uni­form amount of anes­the­sia (sodi­um thiopen­tal) regard­less of their body weight or oth­er fac­tors, such as their tol­er­ance for bar­bi­tu­rates. Researchers con­clud­ed that this prac­tice led to dosages that are below what is nec­es­sary to have a 50 – 50 chance of euth­a­niz­ing many lab­o­ra­to­ry ani­mals, such as rab­bits, dogs, and rats. Without suf­fi­cient anes­the­sia, inmates would feel as if they were being stran­gled while the sec­ond drug, pan­curo­ni­um bro­mide, asphyx­i­at­ed them by bring­ing on paral­y­sis. Then they would feel a burn­ing sen­sa­tion from the third drug, potas­si­um chlo­ride. The study also found evi­dence that the potas­si­um chlo­ride was not always induc­ing car­diac arrest as expect­ed.

​“There may or may not be enough anes­thet­ic onboard for the whole process to do its thing. There’s a win­dow for at least part of the process where they may be quite uncom­fort­able,” said Dr. Leonidas Koniaris, a sur­gi­cal oncol­o­gist at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine and lead author of the study. Deborah Denno, a Fordham University law pro­fes­sor who has stud­ied lethal injec­tions for 15 years, added, ​“The argu­ment that’s always been giv­en about lethal injec­tion is that in the­o­ry, a well-trained per­son could give it humane­ly. This casts doubt on even that.”

Koniaris and his team chose to review exe­cu­tions in California and North Carolina because those states had the most com­plete infor­ma­tion avail­able. The authors of the study includ­ed an anes­the­si­ol­o­gist, a phar­ma­col­o­gist, a mol­e­c­u­lar biol­o­gist, a vet­eri­nar­i­an, an attor­ney and a his­to­ri­an.

Challenges regard­ing the con­sti­tu­tion­al­i­ty of lethal injec­tion have put exe­cu­tions on hold in eleven states. Lethal injec­tion was devised in 1977, after an Oklahoma leg­is­la­tor who opposed cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment worked with the state med­ical exam­in­er to seek a more humane alter­na­tive to elec­tric chairs and fir­ing squads. Though the reg­i­men was nev­er sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly test­ed, it was wide­ly adopt­ed by oth­er states. Today, all but one juris­dic­tion that has the death penal­ty in the United States autho­rizes lethal injec­tion as a method of exe­cu­tion.
(Los Angeles Times, April 24, 2007). See Lethal Injection. Read the Study. Ohio car­ried out an exe­cu­tion by lethal injec­tion on April 24, despite the fact that oth­er Ohio exe­cu­tions have been put on hold pend­ing the final out­come of a chal­lenge to the state’s exe­cu­tion process. Apparently the inmate, James Filiaggi, had not prop­er­ly joined the suit filed by other inmates.

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