Skip to main content

Nebraska: Feds say no to execution drug

State officials said Wednesday they are seeking a new supply of a controversial lethal-injection drug after determining that they probably can't use drugs obtained from an Indian pharmaceutical company.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration informed state corrections officials in early April that Nebraska lacked authority to import controlled substances such as sodium thiopental, a powerful sedative used in lethal-injection executions.

That led corrections officials and the Nebraska Attorney General's Office to decide that the state should obtain the proper import permits and seek a new source of the drug to carry out the death penalty.

The problem with the Indian drug purchase raises the prospect of further delays in the execution of double-murderer Carey Dean Moore.

Moore, 53, was sentenced to die for the execution-style murders of two Omaha cab drivers in 1979, but he has won several stays of that sentence over the years.

Attorney General Jon Bruning asked the Nebraska Supreme Court in January to set a new execution date. On April 21 [--] 10 days after the state learned of DEA's problem with the sodium thiopental the high court set a June 14 execution date for Moore.

But the execution was stayed May 25 after Moore's attorneys raised questions about the quality of the drug Nebraska obtained from Kayem Pharmaceuticals of Mumbai, India.

Moore's attorney, Jerry Soucie, said he was very concerned that the Attorney General's Office did not disclose the drug problem earlier as it was seeking to execute his client.

“I find that to be the most troubling aspect of this case,” Soucie said.

David Cookson, chief deputy attorney general, said his office didn't believe such disclosure was necessary.

Cookson said the office was confident the state would either obtain a new supply of sodium thiopental or be able to rectify the problem with the drugs it bought from India in January.

“As a result, we had nothing to inform the court,” he said. “We felt we were in a position to have the drugs."

Moore would be the first in Nebraska to die by lethal injection, the method adopted by the Legislature in 2009. That followed a Nebraska Supreme Court ruling that declared the electric chair unconstitutional.

When the high court stayed Moore's execution in May, Cookson said the state had abandoned efforts to make its current supply of sodium thiopental legally usable.

Instead, the focus was to have the Department of Corrections obtain federal authority to import such controlled substances.

Cookson said there are several overseas sources for the drug, which is no longer manufactured in the United States.

A spokeswoman for the Corrections Department said the agency now possesses a federal drug import permit and is seeking a new source of the drugs.

Dawn Renee Smith, the spokeswoman, said no decision has been made about what to do with the drugs purchased from India in January. Smith said the DEA has said they could be destroyed by the state crime lab if necessary.

Nebraska becomes the latest state to relinquish its supply of sodium thiopental obtained overseas.

In March, DEA officials seized Georgia's supply of the drug due to questions about how it had been imported. Georgia's supply came from Britain.

Tennessee and Kentucky also have turned over their supplies to federal officials.

Sodium thiopental is a fast-acting sedative that is the first of three drugs administered in an execution. Its use is controversial.

The last U.S. manufacturer quit making it earlier this year, setting off a scramble among states that utilize lethal injection.

Nebraska and at least 6 other states went overseas to obtain the drug. Other states switched to a different sedative [--] phenobarbital, a drug commonly used by veterinarians to euthanize animals to carry out executions.

Soucie has questioned whether the India company was properly registered to export drugs and whether Nebraska violated federal laws on importing controlled substances.

He and other death-penalty opponents also question whether the Indian drugs were a generic version that does not meet U.S. pharmaceutical standards, thus risking unnecessary pain in an execution.

In a June 9 court filing, Soucie included the contents of an email from the Kansas City, Mo., office of the DEA indicating that Nebraska officials were told on April 11 [--] 3 months after obtaining the drugs from India that the Department of Corrections “was not accepted” for the importation of such controlled substances.

The email indicated that George Green, an attorney for the state agency, was told how to apply for valid “importer registration."

Cookson said that once his office learned of DEA's concerns, it reached out to federal officials to determine if the Indian drugs could somehow be used, or if the state needed to obtain permits to obtain a new supply.

Eventually, the decision was made to seek a new supply, he said.

Source: Omaha World-Herald, June 19, 2011
_________________________
Use the tags below or the search engine at the top of this page to find updates, older or related articles on this Website.

Comments

Most viewed (Last 7 days)

Texas death row prisoner dies after more than 30 years behind bars

A Houston-area man convicted of killing his wife died this week after more than 3 decades on death row, marking the 2nd condemned prisoner to die behind bars in the past month.  Prison officials confirmed that William "Billy the Kid" Mason was taken to the hospital on Wednesday and died of cardiac arrest Friday morning.  The 71-year-old was originally sent to death row in 1992, after prosecutors said he'd kidnapped his wife and beaten her to death under a bridge because she was playing the radio too loudly. According to court records, her body was found several days later under some logs near the San Jacinto River.

Louisiana | Mother calls for man exonerated of raping and murdering her child to go free

Wrongful convictions by 2 discredited Mississippi experts tops at least 10. A victim’s family in Louisiana is now speaking out.  Prosecutors fighting the release of death row inmate Jimmie Duncan after a judge found him “factually innocent” of raping and murdering 23-month-old Haley Oliveaux are “not speaking for Haley’s family,” her mother says.  Speaking publicly for the 1st time, Allison Layton Statham called for Duncan to go free in a July 22 bail hearing. “This innocent man is on death row,” she told Mississippi Today. “Justice needs to be done.”  In April, a judge threw out Duncan’s conviction, questioning their conclusions and citing the failures of his court-appointed counsel.

Alabama Gov. sets execution date for Geoffrey Todd West

Ivey sets execution for Geoffrey Todd West for 1997 murder at Alabama convenience store ATTALLA, Ala. – A man convicted of killing a convenience store clerk during a 1997 robbery in Attalla is now scheduled to be executed by nitrogen hypoxia later this year, nearly three decades after the crime shook Attalla and Etowah County.

Tennessee death row inmate makes last-ditch effort to prevent Aug. 5 execution

Attorneys for a Tennessee death row inmate have launched a last-ditch effort to prevent his Aug. 5 execution. In Nashville 's Chancery Court, they are asking a judge to require the Tennessee Department of Correction to deactivate an implanted defibrillation device similar to a pacemaker in the moments before Byron Black 's execution. If the judge rules in their favor, such an order could potentially delay the execution until the state finds someone willing to do the deactivation.

Inside a Mississippi execution: Clarion Ledger reporter recounts what it was like

The visitation center at the Mississippi State Penitentiary in Parchman has no windows, just fluorescent lighting, plastic chairs and tables in a cafeteria-style room. I could technically step outside, but only through a single entrance and doing so meant going through the full security screening all over again — it didn’t feel worth it. A few friendly prison staff walked around, quietly watching us. The Wi-Fi cut in and out. All the while, I returned to the thought I was there to watch someone die.

Inside Japan's secretive execution jails where death row inmates are given minutes notice before facing the noose

From the outside, the Tokyo Detention House looks much like the other tall, austere buildings native to Katsushika City, but its drab facade and tree-lined grounds conceal a far more sinister reality. It is here that Japan's most deplorable criminals are plucked from their cells and hanged underneath fluorescent lights in a cold, bare wood-panelled room.  There is a chillingly theatrical element to how the condemned are executed in the East Asian country - the only member of the G7 besides the US that still metes out capital punishment.  Shackled prisoners are led past a small gold statue of Kannon, a Buddhist figure associated with compassion, as they enter their sterile execution chamber. 

Journalists Reflect on the Challenges and Importance of Media Reporting on the Death Penalty

In this month’s pod­cast episode of 12:01 The Death Penalty in Context, DPIC’s Managing Director Anne Holsinger speaks with Sam Levin, a cor­re­spon­dent with The Guardian who cov­ers crim­i­nal jus­tice and the legal sys­tem, and Jimmy Jenkins, a crim­i­nal jus­tice reporter for The Arizona Republic , about the chal­lenges they encounter when report­ing on the increas­ing secre­tive use of the death penal­ty. Mr. Jenkins has wit­nessed exe­cu­tions in Arizona and Mr. Levin has recent­ly inves­ti­gat­ed South Carolina’s return to exe­cu­tions after a 13-year pause.

Japan executes 'Twitter killer' who murdered nine in 2017

TOKYO — Japan on Friday executed a man dubbed the "Twitter killer" who murdered and dismembered nine people he met online, in the nation's first enactment of the death penalty since 2022. Takahiro Shiraishi, 34, was hanged for killing his young victims, all but one of whom were women, after contacting them on the social media platform now called X. He had targeted users who posted about taking their own lives, telling them he could help them in their plans, or even die alongside them. Justice Minister Keisuke Suzuki said Shiraishi's crimes, carried out in 2017, included "robbery, rape, murder... destruction of a corpse and abandonment of a corpse".

Woman who watched nearly 300 executions explained moment she had to give it up

Michelle Lyons' job wasn't for the fainthearted A woman who watched nearly 300 death row executions take place over 12 years opened up about how her macabre career impacted her life. For more than a decade, it was part of Michelle Lyons' job description to observe the final moments of hundreds of prisoners in the US state of Texas. She says the process never 'become mundane or normal', although she did become acclimatized to it - as she went on to watch so many executions that she 'can't recall' a lot of them.

New execution methods may soon come to Florida

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Next month, the state of Florida will officially be allowed to use new means of executing prisoners on death row — with some caveats. That’s because of a state law (HB 903) that’s set to take effect on July 1, alongside over 120 others. The law actually makes a variety of technical changes to different issues, including prepayment of court costs, statutes of limitations on prisoner lawsuits, and location tracking for inmates. However, one of the more prominent issues tackled by the law is the death penalty. Under prior law, a death sentence carried out in Florida had to be performed via either electrocution or lethal injection. The choice of which was left up to the prisoner being executed.