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Japan | Hakamada found religion, but then felt under attack by ‘the devil’

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Editor's note: This is the last in a four-part series on letters that Iwao Hakamada wrote while on death row. About a decade after cursing God, Iwao Hakamada was baptized Catholic at the Tokyo Detention House on Dec. 24, 1984. “Since I have been given the Christian name Paul, I am keenly feeling that I should be aware of the greatness of Paul.” (June 1985)

Death row lawyers question competence of lethal injection drug supplier

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Lawyers for a US death row prisoner have called for his execution not to go ahead due to serious questions over how the drugs set to be used were imported, and the competence and credibility of their supplier.

A motion filed by Carey Dean Moore’s lawyers in Nebraska asserts that the state’s Department of Correctional Services (DCS) did not obtain the execution drug sodium thiopental from a manufacturer approved by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

It also questions whether the drug supplier's personnel “have the level of competence, professionalism and credibility to be DCS’ source of one of the essential lethal drugs”, in the light of abusive emails between the firm’s director and other staff following an internal dispute.

The Director of India-based Kayem Pharma, which supplied the sodium thiopental, has described his former US colleagues who were in direct contact with Nebraska’s DCS as “drug peddlers” in emails to Moore’s lawyers. Kayem’s former US personnel have sent the Director emails referring to him as a “piece of shit thief”.

Reprieve Investigator Sophie Walker said:

“It is hard to see how Nebraska’s department of corrections can defend the use of these drugs in executions.

“Not only were they improperly imported – but they were bought by Nebraska from people described as ‘drug peddlers’ by one of their own colleagues.

“The revelation of chaotic and abusive relations between Kayem Pharma’s US and Indian personnel casts serious doubt over their competence.

“If Nebraska now pushes ahead with executions using these drugs, it risks irreparably damaging its credibility.”

Source: Reprieve, May 18, 2011
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