Autopsy Reports Expose Cruelty of Lethal Injection

Autopsy reports expose cruelty of lethal injection


It's the stuff of nightmares, and the very definition
of cruel and unusual punishment: A prisoner remaining
aware, but paralyzed and unable to speak, while a
deadly, caustic drug flows through his veins.

This could be the reality of execution in the United
States. Lethal injections, the preferred method of
execution in every state but Nevada, use three drugs:
sodium thiopental, a surgical anesthetic, followed by
the paralytic drug pancuronium bromide, and finally
potassium chloride, which stops the heart and causes
death.

A medical journal's review of autopsy reports in 49
executions by lethal injection in Texas and Virginia
showed that 43 had critically low levels of anesthetic
in their bloodstreams, and 21 had so little that they
were likely conscious throughout the painful process
of stopping their heart.

This is unwelcome news to death-penalty supporters,
but no surprise to those familiar with the history of
lethal injection. It's a procedure that's frequently
botched. The American Medical Association and other
professional medical groups condemn capital
punishment, so doctors and nurses usually refuse to
participate in executions. That means executions are
often performed by under-trained medical technicians,
who often have a hard time finding a vein. Even in
states where trained medical personnel are involved in
executions, it's often to insert intravenous lines
into veins scarred by drug abuse.

If the drugs aren't administered properly, the line
used to feed them into the prisoner's body can clog,
delaying the execution. Even when everything goes
technically right, things go wrong: When the state of
California executed 76-year-old Clarence Ray Allen
last month, the first dose of drugs wasn't enough to
stop his heart.

Florida's lethal injection process follows that of
other states. The only difference is that Florida
inmates are offered Valium, a mild tranquilizer,
before the execution starts. It's hard to imagine a
pill powerful enough to calm the terror and agony of
feeling veins burning as if acid had been injected
into them.

This isn't the first time an execution method fell
short. Two gory electrocutions in Florida speeded the
demise of the electric chair as an execution method
(only Nevada now uses it.) Hanging too often resulted
in prolonged deaths, the firing squad is on its way
out in the last two states that use it and the gas
chamber, perhaps the cruelest of methods used in this
country, probably won't be used again in the United
States.

Now lethal injection is under attack. Two Florida
executions are now on hold while the U.S. Supreme
Court decides whether the inmates will be able to
challenge lethal injection as cruel and unusual.
Clarence Hill, who murdered a police officer in 1982,
was strapped to a gurney with IV tubes in his arms
when the Supreme Court issued a stay. Arthur
Rutherford, who killed a Milton woman in 1985, was
scheduled to die a few days later.

State officials argue that Hill and Rutherford showed
no mercy to their victims, and deserve none from the
state.

Their vision is skewed. The state should not fight for
the right to sink to the same level as murderers.

The grim reality of the death penalty is that it's
hard to end the lives of healthy human beings without
torturing them in some way. Even if the death penalty
had been proven to be effective in stopping crime (it
hasn't) or were fairly administered (it isn't), it is
inescapably cruel, reprehensible to any just society.
Rather than searching for acceptable methods, Florida
leaders should declare their intent to end the death
penalty in this state.
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