Caught between a legal requirement to avoid cruelty, and its desire to kill prisoners, the state of Ohio is struggling to find an acceptable method of execution following the botched, and failed, attempt to put Romell Broom to death on September 15.  As reported in today’s New York Times, the method the state has chosen is injection into the vein of a single, lethal dose of anesthetic.  This seems peculiar, since it was failure to find a suitable vein that led to the botched executions of Joseph Clark and Christopher Newton, as well as the recent Broom fiasco.

In the new Ohio protocol, another alternative, intramuscular injection, is available as a backup.  This method has not been used before, but was given the thumbs up by Massachusetts anesthesiologist Dr. Mark Dershwitz, the one doctor in America who seems willing to help states kill prisoners.  A local Ohio doctor, Jonathan Groner, seems to disagree, suggesting that legal challenges are far from over.  “In the end this is still about killing people.”

It is indeed, and if this protocol proves acceptable to Ohio and federal courts, the lethal injection of Kenneth Biros and others could be back on schedule (the stay of Biros’ December 8 date is only temporary), and Ohio’s one-a-month assembly line of executions could be back in business.

Health professionals confirm death in 1998 Guatemala execution. (c) Jorge Uzon

Ohio’s botched and failed execution of Romell Broom, which has led to the postponement of all the Buckeye State’s execution plans – at least for this year – has created another problem for the state.  It seems that when you are doing something morally repugnant, like putting a human being to death with lethal chemicals, those with ethics don’t want to help you.  So, as Ohio looks for ways to improve its ability to kill prisoners without embarrassing mishaps, it is not surprising that they are having a hard time finding a respectable member of the medical profession who is willing to help them.  Killing someone, it seems, is somewhat of a violation of the whole “do no harm” code of ethics to which health professionals are bound.

According to an AP report, on Friday, Ohio’s Attorney General Richard Cordray filed a brief with a federal District Court explaining that “ethical and professional considerations are deterring doctors and others from offering advice about lethal injection.”

Apparently, due to this difficulty, Ohio now has judges, police and lawmakers helping to find some medical professionals who are willing to take their ethical obligations less seriously and give the state the help it needs to resume killing.

Meanwhile, there is nothing to prevent us from continuing to offer our own – albeit unsolicited – advice, that the best way for Ohio to avoid these moral quandaries it to simply stop executions.

The death penalty is always inhumane, but Ohio’s failed attempt to execute Romell Broom on September 15th was particularly disturbing.  During the two-hour ordeal the execution team repeatedly attempted and failed to find a useable vein in which to insert the lethal injection needle, and eventually had to give up.  Mr. Broom’s execution has been stayed, but Lawrence Reynolds, Darryl Durr, and Kenneth Biros are still scheduled to be put to death before the end of this year. Mr. Reynolds lawyers have filed for a stay of execution, pointing out that this latest failed execution attempt is further evidence of “a pattern of serious problems with the administration of lethal injection in Ohio.”  While the victims of these crimes and their families always suffer greatly, the perpetuation of violence through the death penalty is never the most constructive way to handle such tragedies.

Unfortunately, this situation is not unique; in Ohio alone there have been at least two other poorly handled executions over the last three years. In May of 2006, it took the Ohio execution team nearly half an hour to find a useable vein in condemned prisoner Joseph Clark’s arm, and then that vein collapsed, causing Clark’s arm to swell. The witnesses reported hearing “moaning, crying out and guttural noises” coming from behind the curtain while the execution team continued to try for 30 more minutes to find another vein. It wasn’t until an hour and a half after the execution began that Joseph Clark was pronounced dead.

In 2007 another execution team in Ohio struggled to find useable veins in condemned prisoner, this time Christopher Newton. It was again a prolonged ordeal, and Mr. Newton was not declared dead until nearly two hours after the execution process began.
 
Ohio state officials still have no contingency plan for these kinds of situations, and they are not addressed in the state’s lethal injection protocol. Because of this clear evidence that the state of Ohio has serious problems administering lethal injections, please tell Ohio Governor Ted Strickland to stop executions from being carried out in his state.

In Iran, in January of this year, a man being stoned to death for adultery managed to survive his ordeal by digging his way out of the pit in which he had been buried.  According to an Amnesty International report, citing Iran’s penal code, “if the condemned person manages to escape from the pit, they will not be stoned again if they had been sentenced after confession.” The man who escaped in January was not stoned again that day, though it is believed he was taken back into custody.   

Today, Ohio faces a similar dilemma.  Romell Broom survived the Buckeye state’s attempts to execute him by lethal injection, due to the failure of his executioners to find a useful vein in which to inject the poison.    Does this mean Mr. Broom will no longer face the needle, or will Ohio subject him to a second execution?  It appears that the latter is the case (Ohio Governor Ted Strickland merely granted Mr. Broom a week-long reprieve), although there may be arguments in court that being executed twice would constitute cruel and unusual punishment. 

Ohio has had these problems before: the execution of Christopher Newton (who “volunteered” to be executed by giving up his appeals) took 90 minutes, and the lethal injection of Joseph Clark took 40.  In both cases, the delay was the result of the inability of the execution team to find suitable veins.

Given that this horrible problem keeps re-occurring, it would be wise for Ohio Governor Ted Strickland to at least declare a moratorium and halt executions in his state.

The Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services recently proposed new regulations for lethal injection procedures.  Executions in Maryland have been at a halt since 2005, when a court of appeals ruling found that the execution protocols were illegally adopted.  If the regulations are adopted, they will move the state closer to resuming use of the death penalty.   These regulations have now been published in the Maryland Register, and they are open for comment for the next 30 days.

According to the regulations:

“Comments may be sent to Randy Watson, Assistant Commissioner, Division of Correction, 6776 Reisterstown Road, Baltimore, MD 21215-2342, or call 410-585-3300. Comments will be accepted through August 31, 2009. A public hearing has not been scheduled.”

These new regulations do not appear to address any of the major problems inherent in the use of lethal injection. Among many other things, the regulations propose that:

• Executions would continue using a drug – pancuronium bromide – that is not even permitted for use in euthanizing animals. Medical officials have consistently warned that the combination of drugs proposed here may cause the prisoner a very painful death, and indeed several such botched executions using these drugs have occurred.  
• A certified paramedic must be on duty in some capacity during the execution, either as a part of the execution or standing right outside of the area where the execution takes place.  A licensed physician would also have to be present.  These proposals could result in violations of AMA ethical guidelines. 

There are currently five men on death row in Maryland. While these regulations would not mean that executions would immediately start happening, it does mean that de facto moratorium on executions would end.

Resuming executions would be a huge step backwards for the state of Maryland. Despite a long fight in recent years, the death penalty still has not been outlawed in the state, though it has been restricted. But the current moratorium on executions, coupled with the historically infrequent use of the practice in the state, gives hope that Maryland is not far from joining the other fifteen states (plus D.C.) that have outlawed capital punishment.

Yesterday, the Seattle Times reported that Washington State’s execution team resigned, out of concern that their identities might be revealed during the course of a pending lawsuit over that state’s execution protocol.  This follows the resignation at the end of last year of the chief physician for Washington’s Department of Corrections, who quit out of concern that participation of his staff in executions would be unethical.

In the wake of the US Supreme Court’s Baze decision, which found lethal injection to be constitutional (not cruel and unusual punishment) as long as it is properly administered, lawsuits and investigations have focused on how, in fact, executions are carried out.  Inevitably, this focuses a spotlight on the men and women drawn in by our capital punishment system to actively participate in the killing of prisoners.  Efforts to shield the identities of these people, under the specious argument that their physical safety might be compromised if their names were revealed, have met strong resistance from those who believe that in a democracy we have a fundamental right to know who is carrying out policies in our name, particularly policies as profound as taking the lives of those on death row.

In Washington, a spokesman for the Attorney General said, absurdly:  “We believe the court can confirm the constitutionality of the lethal-injection procedure without knowing the qualifications, training and experience of each of the lethal-injection team members.” (emphasis mine)

Really? How?  How can any court assess an execution procedure without looking at the “qualifications, training and experience” of those carrying it out?  What if, shielded from the courts and the public, the state of Washington were to appoint a team of roller-skating lemurs to administer lethal injections; how could a court assess that protocol’s constitutionality, without knowing about the lemurs?

The fact it, as the death penalty becomes more and more unpopular, efforts to hide its ugly realities from the public are only going to increase.  All the more reason for us, as citizens in a democracy, to demand the full truth about executions carried out in our name.

Jinguan Auto

For many years, it has been known that China uses execution vans, kind of like specially outfitted ambulances, to more efficiently carry out its exceedingly large number of executions.  The method of killing in these vans is lethal injection, which has been slowly but surely replacing the firing squad as China’s preferred means of execution, and both lethal injection and the vans are believed to facilitate the widespread practice of harvesting organs of the executed prisoners, an unbelievably appalling practice.

In October 2006, Sky News did a compelling video report - China’s Execution Buses – on the death penalty in China, including a discussion of the vans and organ harvesting, as well as cases of innocence, and the plight of death penalty defense lawyer Gao Zhisheng who has been harassed and detained since at least 2006, and who was once again detained on February 4 of this year. 

Today, a story in the Irish Times discusses these vans, and the Chinese automaker that manufactures and sells them – Jinguan Auto.    (The execution van itself is here.)

In the months leading up to the Olympics, there were a number of hints and statements that reforms in China’s death penalty were being seriously considered, including a declaration from the Chinese Medical Association “not to transplant organs from prisoners or others in custody, except into members of their immediate families.”  This statement was noted in an Amnesty International report two weeks prior to the Beijing Olympics Opening Ceremonies, but the report went on to caution that “… Ministry of Health officials have reportedly stated that prisoners will remain a source of organs for five more years as execution-related transplantation winds down.” 

Of course, the Olympics are over now, and the execution vans are apparently still providing “slow but steady business” for Jinguan Auto.