Arizona Department of Corrections moves to resume executions with new drugs
- State moves to resume capital punishment
- Arizona Department of Corrections issues new lethal injection guidelines
More than a year after a botched 2014 execution, the Arizona Department of Corrections has issued new guidelines that eliminate a controversial drug combination from the lethal-injection protocol, allow witnesses to see the preparation leading up to an execution, and give defense attorneys access to a cellphone in case of an emergency.
During the July 2014 execution of murderer Joseph Rudolph Wood, who gasped for nearly two hours and was subjected to 15 doses of the death cocktail before dying, his attorneys had to leave the death chamber to find phones in an unsuccessful attempt to stop the proceedings.
The new protocol was released late Friday as part of a stipulated agreement by the state with the Federal Public Defender's Office and a media coalition who filed suit in U.S. District Court in Phoenix. The suit sought more transparency in the way capital punishment is carried out.
"The parties agreed to this process last November, and this is just a next step in the ongoing federal litigation," said Dale Baich of the Federal Public Defender's Office.
Corrections officials declined to comment.
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No execution warrants can be sought from the Arizona Supreme Court, however, until the federal case is settled or adjudicated. There are at least six prisoners on Arizona's death row who have exhausted their appeals and are eligible for execution.
The Arizona Attorney General's Office also filed a motion to reinstate the lawsuit, a first step toward resuming executions.
The federal lawsuit seeks to compel Corrections to disclose information about how it executes death-row prisoners and to allow the media to witness all stages of it.
The new protocol allows journalists to see the prisoner enter the death chamber at a state prison in Florence over closed-circuit TV and watch as the prisoner is strapped to the gurney. During the past several executions, witnesses did not see that stage; viewing began with the insertion of the catheters that carry the lethal drugs. Then, a curtain opened and the actual execution was visible through a window.
ARIZONA INMATES EXECUTED SINCE 1992
The new guidelines will allow the inmate's legal team to bring a mobile phone, computer and digital tablet into the prison, and will have a mobile phone available for the inmate's attorney to use in an emergency.
Absent from the new protocol is the drug combination of midazolam, a Valiumlike drug, and the narcotic hydromorphone that was used on Wood.
Instead, there will be a three-drug process that uses midazolam as a sedative in conjunction with a second drug to paralyze the inmate; then, potassium chloride will be used to stop the heart. This process was approved by the U.S. Supreme Court in June in an opinion related to a botched April 2014 execution in Oklahoma.
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There are also provisions to use the drugs pentobarbital and thiopental alone or as part of a three-drug regimen, but neither drug is available for executions in the United States.
On Thursday, the day before the new protocol was released, The Arizona Republic reported that Arizona had again attempted to import thiopental illegally from overseas. The drug is no longer produced in the U.S., and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration will not allow it to be imported. At least two other states unsuccessfully attempted the same import last summer, and the drugs were confiscated upon arrival.
The Republic first reported on illegal imports of thiopental to Arizona in 2010. The FDA then clamped down on the imports and several European nations forbade its export.
If U.S. District Court Judge Neil Wake lifts the stay on the federal lawsuit, the attorneys for the Federal Public Defender and the First Amendment Coalition of Arizona will have 21 days to refile their complaint.