Oklahoma inmate Clayton Lockett died during a botched execution [reuters.com] on Tuesday, minutes after a doctor had called a halt to the procedure, raising more questions about new death penalty cocktails used by the state and others. Thirteen minutes after a doctor administered a lethal injection at the state's death chamber in McAlester, Lockett lifted his head and started mumbling. The doctor halted the execution, said state corrections department spokesman Jerry Massie. Lockett died of an apparent massive heart attack about 40 minutes after the procedure started, he said. "We believe that a vein was blown and the drugs weren't working as they were designed to. The director ordered a halt to the execution," Massie said. The troubled execution was expected to have national implications, with lawyers for death row inmates having argued that new lethal injection cocktails used in Oklahoma and other states could cause undue suffering and violate constitutional protections against cruel and unusual punishment. [...]
[...]Oklahoma had set up a new lethal injection procedure and cocktail of chemicals earlier this year after it was no longer able to obtain the drugs it had once used for executions. "After weeks of Oklahoma refusing to disclose basic information about the drugs for tonight's lethal injection procedures, tonight Clayton Lockett was tortured to death," said Madeline Cohen, an attorney for Warner. Oklahoma and other states have been scrambling to find new suppliers and chemical combinations after drug makers, [nytimes.com] mostly in Europe, imposed sales bans because they objected to having medications made for other purposes being used in lethal injections.[...]
[...] Lockett, 38, was convicted of first-degree murder, rape, kidnapping and robbery [tulsaworld.com] for a 1999 crime spree with two co-defendants. He was found to have shot teen-ager Stephanie Nieman and buried her alive in a shallow grave where she eventually died.
Do you think this is torture, or simply a successful execution?
What alternative execution methods would you prefer to see?
