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Originally posted by Mike Mitchell:
We should make firing squad an option. Let them choose.

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Originally posted by ledvm:
Where does it state in the BORs that expired but perfectly fine euthanasia drugs can’t be used to execute criminals? The people who wrote the BORs were fine with hanging.

Maybe there is a clause about it in Texas Law…will have to check on that.

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Originally posted by LHeym500:

quote:

Originally posted by ledvm:
Where does it state in the BORs that expired but perfectly fine euthanasia drugs can’t be used to execute criminals? The people who wrote the BORs were fine with hanging.

Maybe there is a clause about it in Texas Law…will have to check on that.

The Eight Amendment. And according to the article the Texas State Legislative Act.

Sympathy has little to do with it. As Justice Scalia said about the death penalty, I'm an originalist and a textualist, not a nut.”

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Amdt8.3.9.10 Execution Methods
Eighth Amendment:

Link

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

Throughout the history of the United States, various methods of execution have been deployed by the states in carrying out the death penalty. In the early history of the nation, hanging was the “nearly universal form of execution.” 1 In the late 19th century and continuing into the 20th century, the states began adopting electrocution as a substitute for hanging based on the “well-grounded belief that electrocution is less painful and more humane than hanging.” 2 And by the late 1970s, following Gregg, states began adopting statutes allowing for execution by lethal injection, perceiving lethal injection to be a more humane alternative to electrocution or other popular pre-Gregg means of carrying out the death penalty, such as firing squads or gas chambers.3 Today the overwhelming majority of the states that allow for the death penalty use lethal injection as the “exclusive or primary method of execution.” 4

Despite a national evolution over the past two hundred years with respect to the methods deployed in carrying out the death penalty, the choice to adopt arguably more humane means of capital punishment has not been the direct result of a decision from the Supreme Court. Citing public understandings from the time of the Framing, the Court has articulated some limits to the methods that can be employed in carrying out death sentences, such as those that “superadd” terror, pain, or disgrace to the penalty of death,5 for example by torturing someone to death.6 Nonetheless, the Supreme Court has “never invalidated a State’s chosen procedure” for carrying out the death penalty as a violation of the Eighth Amendment.7 In 1878, the Court, relying on a long history of using firing squads in carrying out executions in military tribunals, held that the “punishment of shooting as a mode of executing the death penalty” did not constitute a cruel and unusual punishment.8 Twelve years later, the Court upheld the use of the newly created electric chair, deferring to the judgment of the New York state legislature and finding that it was “plainly right” that electrocution was not “inhuman and barbarous.” 9 Fifty-seven years later, a plurality of the Court concluded that it would not be “cruel and unusual” to execute a prisoner whose first execution failed due to a mechanical malfunction, as an “unforeseeable accident” did not amount to the “wanton infliction of pain” barred by the Eighth Amendment.10

The declaration in Trop that the Eighth Amendment “must draw its meaning from the evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society” 11 and the continued reliance on that declaration by a majority of the Court in several key Eighth Amendment cases12 set the stage for potential “method of execution” challenges to the newest mode for the death penalty: lethal injection. Following several decisions clarifying the proper procedural mechanism to raise challenges to methods of execution,13 the Court, in Baze v. Rees, rejected a method of execution challenge to Kentucky’s lethal injection protocol, a three-drug protocol consisting of (1) an anesthetic that would render a prisoner unconscious; (2) a muscle relaxant; and (3) an agent that would induce cardiac arrest.14 A plurality opinion, written by Chief Justice Roberts and joined by Justices Kennedy and Alito, concluded that to constitute cruel and unusual punishment, a particular method for carrying out the death penalty must present a “substantial” or “objectively intolerable” risk of harm.15 In so concluding, the plurality opinion rejected the view that a prisoner could succeed on an Eighth Amendment method of execution challenge by merely demonstrating that a “marginally” safer alternative existed, because such a standard would “embroil” the courts in ongoing scientific inquiries and force courts to second guess the informed choices of state legislatures respecting capital punishment.16 As a result, the plurality reasoned that to address a “substantial risk of serious harm” effectively, the prisoner must propose an alternative method of execution that is feasible, can be readily implemented, and can significantly reduce a substantial risk of severe pain.17 Given the “heavy burden” that the plurality placed on those pursuing an Eighth Amendment method of execution claim, the plurality upheld Kentucky’s protocol in light of (1) the consensus of state lethal injection procedures; (2) the safeguards Kentucky put in place to protect against any risks of harm; and (3) the lack of any feasible, safer alternative to the three-drug protocol.18 Four other Justices, for varying reasons, concurred in the judgment of the Court.19

Seven years later, in a seeming reprise of the Baze litigation, a majority of the Court in Glossip v. Gross formally adopted the Baze plurality’s reasoning with respect to Eighth Amendment claims involving methods of execution, resulting in the rejection of a challenge to Oklahoma’s three-drug lethal injection protocol.20 Following Baze, anti-death penalty advocates successfully persuaded pharmaceutical companies to stop providing states with the anesthetic that constituted the first of the three drugs used in the protocol challenged in the 2008 case, resulting in several states, including Oklahoma, substituting a sedative called midazolam in the protocol.21 In Glossip, the Court held that Oklahoma’s use of midazolam in its execution protocol did not violate the Eighth Amendment, because the challengers had failed to present a known and available alternative to midazolam and did not adequately demonstrate that the drug was ineffective in rendering a prisoner insensate to pain.22

Four years after Glossip, the Court further clarified its method-of-execution jurisprudence in Bucklew v. Precythe.23 In that case, a death row inmate challenged the State of Missouri’s use of the drug pentobarbital in executions because, regardless of its effect on other inmates, the drug would result in him experiencing “severe pain” due to his “unusual medical condition.” 24 The Court, in an opinion by Justice Gorsuch, began by framing the Baze-Glossip test as fundamentally asking whether a state’s chosen method of execution is one that “cruelly superadds pain to the death sentence” relative to an alternative method of execution.25 With this framework in mind, the Court first rejected the petitioner’s argument that Baze and Glossip, which involved facial challenges, did not govern his as-applied challenge.26 Justice Gorsuch reasoned that determining whether the state is cruelly “superadding” pain to a punishment necessarily requires comparing that method with a viable alternative, an inquiry that simply does not hinge on whether a death row inmate’s challenge rests on facts unique to his particular medical condition.27 In so concluding, the Court clarified that an inmate seeking to identify an alternative method of execution is not limited to choosing a method that the state currently authorizes and can instead point, for example, to a well-established protocol in another state.28 Applying the Baze-Glossip framework, the Court then rejected the petitioner’s proposed alternative of using the drug nitrogen hypoxia because (1) the proposal was insufficiently detailed to permit a finding that the state could carry out the execution easily and quickly;29 (2) the proposed drug was an “untried and untested” method of execution;30 and (3) the underlying record showed that any risks created by pentobarbital and mitigated by nitrogen hypoxia were speculative in nature.31

As a result of Baze, Glossip, and Bucklew, it appears that only those modes of the death penalty that demonstrably result in substantial risks of harm for the prisoner relative to viable alternatives can be challenged as unconstitutional.32 This standard appears to result in the political process (as opposed to the judicial process) being the primary means of making wholesale changes to a particular method of execution.33

quote:

Originally posted by Mike Mitchell:
We should make firing squad an option. Let them choose.

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Why all the drama?

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Originally posted by DuggaBoye:

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Why all the drama?

bloody lawyers

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Originally posted by ledvm:
Mike,
Does Texas Law say anything about not using expired expiration date pentobarbital in executions?

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Originally posted by Bill/Oregon:
How do you do it in the UAE, Saeed? Hanging? Ex-sanguination by decapitation? Guess I could look it up.

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Originally posted by eezridr:
Much easier to take them out in the country, hit them in the back of the skull with a 20 oz ball pin hammer. Feed them to the buzzards.
You can use that hammer over and over again.
Save money and help a endangered species.

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Originally posted by MtElkHunter:
IMO one of the most effective, efficient and cheapest means of execution is still the guillotine. Once built it can be used over and over for no cost. Death is within a few seconds if not instantaneous. Hose it off and bring the next one.

quote:

Originally posted by Mike Mitchell:

quote:

Originally posted by ledvm:
Mike,
Does Texas Law say anything about not using expired expiration date pentobarbital in executions?

Not that I am aware of but it seems to me that if you are going to execute a man, it ought to be done in the most efficient and effective way possible and it should be done in a way that doesn't potentially violate the 8th Amendment prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. If you're going to use drugs, use drugs that haven't expired. I don't understand the problem. Buy some new drugs.

There are problems, believe it or not, with availability. And, any competent pharmacologist or physician…can testify to the fact that year out of date pentobarbital is fine.

The whole lethal injection process seems unsound to me and this is just another potential illustration of that. There are all sorts of horror stories out there of botched executions where lethal injection was used. Difficulty finding veins for the injection site, lengthy periods of time until death after injection, etc.

The irony of it is that lethal injection was thought to be more humane than electrocution, hanging, shooting, etc. and it's turned out that it's probably the opposite. It seems to me that a quick shot to the back of the head with a centerfire rifle cartridge is about as humane as you're going to get in terms of causing instantaneous brain death.

I've got mixed feelings about the death penalty. I don't have a problem with the concept but history shows the process is problematic.

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Originally posted by Aspen Hill Adventures:
As we know there are other proven lethal methods besides chemicals.

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Originally posted by Bill/Oregon:
Saeed, I think death by firing squad is entirely appropriate. The thing that sheds most doubt on the death penalty is the troubling number of cases in which DNA evidence has, upon dispassionate examination, later proved the executed person's innocence. This is not your normal "whoops, sorry" moment; the state has put to death an innocent person, which is unforgivable.