"The right of freely examining public characters and measures, and of freely communicating thereon... has ever been justly deemed the only effectual guardian of every other right." -- James Madison
In our post-9/11 world, government secrecy has become an accepted norm, whether the topic is national security, government spending or constitutional protocols for executions. (Consider that Americans barely protested at the news that President Bush had authorized government agents to secretly listen in on our phone calls and read our emails.)
Yet transparency in government is critical to maintaining a democracy. Meaningful public review enables citizens to hold their elected officials accountable, which ensures an open and free government. Without transparency in government, those in power fall prey to corruption and general incompetence. The present controversy over lethal injection protocols is a prime example of this.
For three decades, prison employees in states across the nation have implemented virtually every aspect of lethal injection executions, largely outside of public view and without legislative or executive oversight. Unfortunately, the U.S. Supreme Court dodged the issue of government secrecy and its impact on lethal injection procedures and executions when it recently handed down its ruling in Baze v. Rees.
The case challenged Kentucky's lethal injection protocol, which uses a three-drug injection sequence that has been shown to carry an unnecessary risk of inflicting pain on the condemned. Currently, 36 of the 37 states that have the death penalty use lethal injections and have protocols similar to Kentucky's. This method of execution was first used in Oklahoma and then adopted by other states with no scientific study as to its effects on those executed.
However, studies have since indicated that the risks of torturous death are real and significant. In fact, the possibility exists than an inmate executed by lethal injection could remain conscious, experiencing severe pain as he slowly dies. For example, Angel Diaz took more than twice the usual time to die and had to be given a rare second dose of deadly chemicals. Consequently, a medical examiner reported that Diaz had chemical burns on both arms. "It really sounds like he was tortured to death," said Dr. Jonathan Groner of the Ohnoio State Medical School. Diaz's botched execution led Florida Governor Jeb Bush to suspend all executions.
Regrettably, incompetence resulting in botched executions has become a hallmark of many state and federal executions. Even so, states continue to cloak their lethal injection protocols and executions in secrecy.
For example, some of the most closely guarded secrets relate to the qualifications and training (or lack thereof) of those administering lethal injections, often to the detriment of death row prisoners. In Missouri, for example, when the media uncovered the identity of the state's lethal injection supervisor, they also learned that he had confused dosages during executions and had lost his privileges to practice in two hospitals. Incredibly, after a federal court barred him from participating in Missouri executions, he was hired as part of the federal government's execution team.
Incredibly, the responsibility for creating lethal injection procedures is often delegated to prison employees without discussion, meaningful study or oversight by elected representatives. In California, in response to a federal court order, corrections officials agreed to reexamine their policies but then sought to keep the review process secret. Although the judge denied that request, the construction of a new death chamber began without the public, their elected representatives or even the governor knowing anything about it. Many states even refuse to disclose information about their execution procedures to lawyers whose clients will be subjected to lethal injections.
The shroud of secrecy remains even after an inmate's death, preventing a final assessment of the lethal injection procedure. All but two states maintain complete secrecy regarding post-execution records and autopsies. These records contain data that is critical to evaluating whether inmates were conscious during execution, but government officials refuse to release this information. However, scientists who have studied post-execution materials in the two states where they are available, North Carolina and California, have concluded that lethal injection is not working the way states claim.
The manner in which capital punishment is meted out in this country is nothing less than a travesty of justice. And lethal injections, with their shroud of secrecy, are just one part of the problem. We must hold our government accountable, especially when it comes to the state executing citizens. If we are going to allow the government to kill us, then we certainly need to know all the facts beforehand. Clearly, we are in need of a nationwide moratorium on executions until these matters are sorted out and opened up to public review.
As Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis once observed, "Sunlight is the best disinfectant."
I equate The US Judicial system's bias in handing down death penalty convictions in much the same way I view Shari law death sentences... wholly imperfect and systemically biased to the point of prejudice.
The argument against penalties of death as cruel and inhumane based upon the means of dispatch, misses the point entirely.
Justice Stevens should take a more proactive role in stopping this madness. He certainly didn't “respect precedents that remain a part of our law” when he played the leading role in reinstituting death as a form of punishment.
White murderers are twice as likely to be executed in the US as are black murderers and are executed, on average, 12 months more quickly than are black death row inmates.
It is often stated that it is the race of the victim which decides who is prosecuted in death penalty cases. Although blacks and whites make up about an equal number of murder victims, capital cases are 6 times more likely to involve white victim murders than black victim murders. This, so the logic goes, is proof that the US only cares about white victims.
Hardly. Only capital murders, not all murders, are subject to a capital indictment. Generally, a capital murder is limited to murders plus secondary aggravating factors, such as murders involving burglary, carjacking, rape, and additional murders, such as police murders, serial and multiple murders. White victims are, overwhelmingly, the victims under those circumstances, in ratios nearly identical to the cases found on death row.
Any other racial combinations of defendants and/or their victims in death penalty cases, is a reflection of the crimes committed and not any racial bias within the system, as confirmed by studies from the Rand Corporation (1991), Smith College (1994), U of Maryland (2002), New Jersey Supreme Court (2003) and by a view of criminal justice statistics, within a framework of the secondary aggravating factors necessary for capital indictments.
Here is a great assesment.
http://washingtontimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080429/COMMENTARY02/705701136/1012/commentary
And what would you have Justice Stevens do, completely contradict the Constitution?
Twice, the 5th Amendment authorizes execution.
(1) “ No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury . . . " and
(2) ". . . nor shall any person . . . be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law . . . ”.
The 14th amendment is, equally, clear:
" . . . nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law . . ."
Not surprisingly, some 200 years of US Supreme Court decisions support those amendments and the US Constitution in authorizing and enforcing the death penalty.
Some wrongly believe that the US Supreme Court decision, Furman v Georgia (1972), found the death penalty unconstitutional. It did not.
The decisions found that the statutory enforcement of the death penalty in the US was a violation of the 8th Amendement.
The death penalty is integral within the constitution.
In every state, there are hundreds or thousands of people trained for IV application of drugs or the taking of blood. No secret.
There are very few errors in lethal injections which can be attributed to personnel error.
The simple fact is that, if necessary, non medical personnel can be properly trained to mix and administer the chemicals used in lethal injection. No secret.
It appears that some 500-1000 innocent patients die, every year, in the US, due to some type of medical misadventure, with anesthesia. (2)
Furthermore, even with those rare errors in lethal injection, those cases resulted in the death of the inmate - the intended outcome for the guilty murderer.
In the errors of medical professionals, we are speaking of a large number of deaths and injuries to innocent patients - the opposite of the intended outcome.
No secret.
2) "Deaths from Medical Misadventure"at
www(dot)wrongdiagnosis.com/m/medical_misadventure/deaths.htm
and
"Health Grades Quality Study: Patient Safety in American Hospitals, July 2004"
www.(dot)healthgrades.com/media/english/pdf/HG_Patient_Safety_Study_Final.pdf
Hartford Courant, "Ross Autopsy Stirs Execution Debate----Results Cited To Counter Talk Of Pre-Death Pain", 8/11/05
Autopsy results of executed murderer Michael Ross are being cited by several prominent doctors to refute a highly publicized article that appeared in The Lancet (4/05).
Critics say the Lancet article does not account for postmortem redistribution of the anesthetic - thiopental. The redistribution accounts for the lower levels of thiopental on which Dr. Koniaris based his Lancet article conclusions that the levels of anesthetic were inadequate.
The Ross autopsy results document this redistribution, bolstering the critics' assertions.
Dr. H. Wayne Carver II, Connecticut's chief medical examiner, was aware of the controversial Lancet article before performing the Ross autopsy. He took the additional step of drawing a sample of Ross's blood 20 minutes after he was pronounced dead at 2:25 a.m. May 13. Carver took a subsequent sample during the autopsy, which began about 7 hours later, at 9:40 a.m.
Dr.Heath, a New York anesthesiologist and one of the numerous doctors who have signed letters to The Lancet challenging the Koniaris article, said it clearly substantiates the postmortem redistribution of the thiopental.
Dr. Groner, a pediatric surgeon described the Ross autopsy results as "a powerful refutation" of the Lancet-Koniaris study.
Dr. Mozayani, a forensic toxicologist with the Harris County Medical Examiner's Office in Texas, said the level of thiopental "drops quite a bit" after death - "the Ross autopsy report "make sense."
The drugs used in lethal injection, their effects and their IV application are well known. No secret.
Some specualte inmates may be conscious, but paralyzed, during execution.
There is very rare evidence this may have occurred.
If properly administered, it cannot occur with the properties and amounts of the chemicals used, within the time frame of an execution. No secret.
The Lancet and PLoS articles did not/could not identify one case where evidence existed than an inmate was conscious during execution.
The Lancet article identified 21 cases where the level of after death sodium thiopental was below that used in surgery, suggesting possible consciousness.
Nonsense. Sodium thiopental is absorbed rapidly into the body. Long after execution testing means nothing with regard to the levels at the time of execution. Nothing. No secret.
The PLoS research/article asks: "Lethal Injection for Execution: Chemical Asphyxiation?"
The question mark says it all. Conclusion: " . . . our findings "SUGGEST" that current lethal injection protocols "MAY" not reliably effect death through the mechanisms intended, indicating a failure of design and implementation. "IF" thiopental and potassium chloride fail to cause anesthesia and cardiac arrest, potentially aware inmates "COULD" die through pancuronium-induced asphyxiation." (quote and caps for emphasis)
SUGGEST-MAY- IF-COULD-MAYBE Speculation. No secret.
For euthanasia, Belgium and the Netherlands recommend Pancuronium (a paralitic)in order to stop breathing, after administering sodium thiopental - the first 2 dugs protocol for lethal injection.
wweek.com/___ALL_OLD_HTML/euthanasics.html
No secret.