Lethal Injection: A Brief History

Published June 25, 2008

The state of Virginia is scheduled to execute Robert Yarbrough on Wednesday for the 1997 murder of elderly shopkeeper Cyril Hugh Hamby. Yarbrough would be the 100th person put to death in Virginia since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976 and the eighth in the country to die by lethal injection since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in April that Kentucky's method of execution using a cocktail of three deadly drugs did not, in fact, constitute "cruel and unusual punishment" under the Eighth Amendment as petitioners alleged.

The ruling — effectively allowed executions by lethal injection to recommence after a seven-month unofficial moratorium. But the legal wrangling over lethal injection is hardly over. On June 10, an Ohio judge ordered his state to do away with its lethal injection drug combination in favor of a single large dose of barbiturates, a method commonly used to euthanize animals. The ruling is likely to prompt another nationwide review of the policy of death by lethal injection — a method of execution that's been a subject of controversy since its inception.

The first proposal for injected drugs as a form of capital punishment came in the late 19th century, when a New York commission on capital punishment included the suggestion that it might prove a more humane death than hanging. According to Robert M. Bohm, a professor at the University of Central Florida who has written extensively on capital punishment, the proposal was rejected over concerns it would lead the public to associate the hypodermic needle — only recently introduced as an important medical tool — with death. During World War II, lethal injection was part of the Nazis' chilling arsenal of methods for disposing of sick, weak and disabled prisoners, along with the gas chamber and firing squad. After the war, death by lethal injection faded again from view; it was proposed in the U.K. in the 1950s, but rejected by the Royal Commission on Capital Punishment due to objections from the medical community.

Then, in 1977, an Oklahoma medical examiner named Jay Chapman proposed that death row inmates be executed using three drugs administered in a specific sequence: a barbiturate (to anesthetize inmates), pancuronium bromide (to paralyze inmates and stop their breathing), and lastly potassium chloride (which stops the heart). A simpler, barbiturate-only procedure was rejected on the grounds that the public would not support a killing method for humans modeled after that used for animals, according to Ty Alper, a lawyer who represents death row inmates and is associate director of the Death Penalty Clinic at the University of California at Berkeley School of Law.

Despite the fact that Chapman had scant experience with pharmacology — his expertise was in forensic pathology — the proposal was well received. Lethal injection gave executioners another option besides electrocution, which could set inmates on fire and cause extreme pain; in addition, prisoners who were paralyzed would not writhe around or cry out as they died, which made watching executions easier for witnesses. Chapman's proposal was approved by the Oklahoma state legislature the same year and quickly adopted by other states. Texas was the first to use the procedure in 1982, executing 40 year-old Charles Brooks for murdering Fort Worth mechanic David Gregory.

In the years since, lethal injection has become the standard method in the U.S., although other types of executions could still be carried out in some states. Prisoners in some jurisdictions can choose their method of execution, and the vast majority opt for lethal injection. In all, 936 out of the 1,107 U.S. prisoners executed since 1977 have died by the method, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. Just five U.S. inmates have been executed any other way since 2000 — all by the electric chair — although other options are still on the books in some states, including the firing squad in Utah, hanging in Washington and the gas chamber in Arizona. All told, two U.S. prisoners have died by firing squad since 1977, three by hanging and 11 by the gas chamber.

The basic method for killing someone by lethal injection in the U.S. is fairly consistent. The inmate is strapped to a gurney, covered with a sheet, and intravenous lines are connected to both arms. After last rites and an opportunity for any final words, the drugs are typically administered by a prison employee or medical professional either in another room or behind a curtain. (The ethical implications for medical professionals participating in executions are a matter of much debate: most of the country's leading medical organizations, including the American Medical Association, American Nurses Association and American Society of Anesthesiologists oppose their members' involvement.) After a cardiac monitor indicates an inmate's heart has definitively stopped, the inmate is declared dead.

Outside the U.S., according to Amnesty International, lethal injection executions have been carried out in China, Thailand, Guatemala, and the Philippines, although the latter two countries recently outlawed capital punishment. (Taiwan technically permits lethal injection executions, but has never killed anyone with this method.) China, which executes more people than any other nation by far, is phasing out death by gunshot in favor of lethal injection; the government provides mobile execution vans that travel to smaller cities and towns without permanent death chambers. China said in 2006 that its high court would review all death penalty cases and the government is reportedly trying to reduce the total number of executions this year, as the Beijing summer Olympic games approach.

Source: TIME.com