Libertarian ping.To be added or removed from my ping list freepmail me or post a message here
Posted on 03/08/2006 8:00:32 PM PST by NormsRevenge
The American Civil Liberties Union claimed in a federal lawsuit Wednesday that California's lethal injection protocol violates the First Amendment rights of execution witnesses by not allowing them to see if the inmate is experiencing pain before death.
The suit, filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, says the only reason San Quentin State Prison officials inject a paralyzing agent is to sanitize the execution and prevent witnesses from perhaps seeing convulsions.
The paralyzing drug, according to the lawsuit, "makes it impossible for witnesses to determine whether death row inmates in California are being subjected to substantial and unnecessary pain before dying."
The induced paralysis, the group argued, conceals significant information to which the public is entitled.
The ACLU, which filed the suit on behalf of San Francisco-based Pacific News Service, made a similar argument a year ago before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of a condemned inmate. The court rejected it on procedural grounds, and did not reach the merits of the challenge.
In response to Wednesday's filing, Nathan Barankin, spokesman for Attorney General Bill Lockyer, said "The ACLU does not have a right to determine what method the state of California should use in carrying out the death penalty." He said the "paralyzing agent effectively stops inmate breathing."
Under California's injection protocol, a sedative, then a paralyzing agent and finally heart-stopping drugs are injected. The state is seeking court permission to drip a sedative continually to ensure unconsciousness.
At California executions, about two dozen members of the media, in addition to public officials and relatives of the slain are present. They are able to see prison officials strap the condemned man onto a gurney, see them wrap the inmate's fists into a ball of tape and watch as they poke him with needles.
Prison officials then move out of public site and the drugs begin pouring.
Wednesday's lawsuit comes two weeks after the execution of California prisoner Michael Morales was called off amid questions of whether inmates suffer too much pain during the execution in violation of the Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment.
Litigation is ongoing in the Morales case, with hearings on California's injection protocol set to begin May 2 in San Jose federal court. The Supreme Court has never addressed whether lethal injection amounts to cruel and unusual punishment, and 37 states use an injection protocol similar to California's.
The case is Pacific News Service v. Woodford, 06-1793
These people will never be satisfied.......
now THERE'S the best suggestion I've heard all year
If you want cheep and sure fire to work, nitrogen asphyxiation. Rope has to be new so it will not break instead of the person's neck. Plus if you don't get it right, the person still is in a lot of pain and chokes to death.... or bleeds out when the head pops off the body. And that is a real mess (not to mention bio hazard) to deal with.
OMG WTF BBQ?
Somebody needs to slap whatever the ACLU's using for brains out of their heads and slap something more useful in there.
You would think that the ACLU would vigorously defend a syringe's right to say, "Now you die."
The last guy they shot took 4 .30-30 bullets through the heart. The chair he was strapped into sat inside a sheet metal catch basin with a tall splash board on the back side.
Well there is evidently some controversy over this. I think that the question needs to be answered by someone, or some entity, that has experienced lethal injection.
Solution: administer lethal injection to the ALCU and then let them tesitfy in court.
Expenditure....a bit of time and 7 bullets (one is always a blank).
Neat, sweet, and final.
Libertarian ping.To be added or removed from my ping list freepmail me or post a message here
Bullet in head is quick.
I can't believe no one has actually posted the First Amendment here, as a proper subject of discussion, so I'll do it for you. Sheesh!!
Amendment ICongress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or prohibiting execution witnesses from seeing whether the condemned experience pain immediately prior to death, as by administering a sedative-based lethal injection to the latter; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people to petition the Government for redress of grievences.
Looks like this is an open and shut case for the ACLU, sorry to say!
Do I really have to identify this as sarcasm? Honestly?
Maybe its time to test that on random ACLU scumbags...let them evaluate it personally....not that they'll be in any condition to tell us how it went.
Don't forget to support the Alliance Defense Fund --- they are fighting the ACLU every day.
www.alliancedefensefund.org
I say we subject death row inmates to Hillary TV 24/7. They'll be begging for death in a week or two!
In 1981, I actually joined this group,
Have you gotton all the slime off your skin yet or are there still residual traces to this day? :-)
How bout an abattoir where we can put these clowns on an assembly line for termination?
Electric bleachers?
The American Civil Liberties Union claimed in a federal lawsuit Wednesday that California's lethal injection protocol violates the First Amendment rights of execution witnesses
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