Death Penalty
Arizona’s attorney general has put a hold on executions in the state until the completion of a review of death penalty protocols ordered by the new governor.
Amber McLaughlin, 49, is scheduled to die by injection Tuesday for killing a former girlfriend in 2003.
The report attributes the crisis to “executioner incompetence, failures to follow protocols or defects in the protocols themselves.”
The former public defender dissented with the court's decision not to take the case of a death row inmate who wasn’t given evidence during his trial.
WHAT'S HAPPENING
Ivana Hrynkiw was ultimately allowed to witness the killing of Joe Nathan James Jr., who was executed against the wishes of his victim’s family members.
“This decision is perverse. It is illogical,” Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in her dissent in Shinn v. Ramirez.
Clarence Dixon, 66, died by lethal injection for his conviction in killing a 21-year-old college student in 1978.
A federal public defender praised Republican Gov. Bill Lee for his “great leadership” for launching the review.
The U.S. Supreme Court declined an attorney request to stop the execution of Carl Wayne Buntion, 78, for the 1990 fatal shooting of Houston police officer James Irby.
The last execution by firing squad in the U.S. was in 2010.