A death row inmate who had his execution blocked by a federal court that cited Alabama’s “secrecy” concerning its execution procedure says that procedure could leave him conscious while drugs that stop his breathing and his heart flow through his body.
Attorneys for Thomas Arthur, who was convicted in a 1982 murder-for-hire scheme, argue that the use of pentobarbital to anesthetize a prisoner during an execution violates Arthur’s Eighth Amendment protections.
Suhana Han, Arthur’s attorney, claims the drug does not work fast enough to prevent the inmate from feeling the potentially painful effects of the two drugs that follow, and that the state’s secrecy surrounding its execution protocols makes it impossible to determine whether its use constitutes cruel and unusual punishment, or even if the state follows its own procedures during executions.
Documents filed by Arthur’s attorneys cite the execution of inmate Eddie Powell last year, in which officials apparently did not pinch Powell, the final step of a consciousness test before the fatal drugs are administered.
“What we’re asking the court to do is allow us the opportunity to prove our claim,” Han said. “Alabama has never had its lethal injection process challenged at trial on the merits.”
Arthur was scheduled to be executed March 29, but the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals on March 21 overturned a lower court’s dismissal of Arthur’s appeal on the use of pentobarbital, finding there was no evidence that Alabama was conducting executions in a constitutional manner.
Source: Montgomery Advertiser, April 1, 2012
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