Question about lethal injection

[Leafy3]

Grim subject, I know, but why is it seemingly so hard for prisons in the states to get it right? It's clearly an unpleasant way to go...Why don't they put the person under a general anaesthetic first?

We euthanise animals quickly & painlessly, why don't they (can't they?) use the same drugs on humans?

Drug companies don't want to sell to prisons, and qualified doctors aren't allowed carry out punitive lethal injections. So you have unqualified people doing it with less-than-optimal supplies.

I suspect they also prefer their prisoners to suffer

This is my understanding, but may be incorrect. Pets are happily pts with pentobarbital. No issues I’m aware of and in my personal experience of pets they have been really good, instantaneous deaths. However, no drug company or wholesaler will supply it for the purpose of lethal injection, not because they give a shit, but they don’t want years of the anti death penalty brigade picketing endlessly outside their facilities. That means other things have had to be used for lethal injection, usually potassium chloride together with some other drugs such as muscle paralysers (Dexter style). Problem is, this is not the ‘nice’ death pentobarbital enables, and I believe some have taken over half an hour to cause death with it being pretty unpleasant meanwhile.

Added to the no trained medical staff being involved point and difficulties in getting supplies of the drugs - the prisoners are often former IV drug users or have medical issues from 20+ years of being on death row, so getting IV access isn't straightforward. From what I've read about some of the "botched" cases it can often be because of struggles to get a good line in, or drugs leaking out of veins and being slower to absorb.

They've experimented with nitrogen hypoxia in a few places.

The whole thing is barbaric

I would presume their victims feel the same

A few reasons, I think: primarily, as the fundamental tenent of the Hippocratic Oath is 'first, do no harm', no medical professional with any morals would want to be involved in state-sanctioned murder. As a result, a lethal injection would be administered by somebody with little to no training.

Secondly, no pharmaceutical company would want to have their name attached to the supply of lethal drugs (see, for example, Bayer). As a PP said, it's not necessarily because they're lovely fluffy people but the optics aren't great from a PR perspective.

Argh, I can't edit my post, but my reference to Bayer is with regard to the company's association with the Nazis during WWII and the fact that they are still trying to ward that off...

Some states are looking at using a firing squad as an alternative to the injections due to the drugs being unavailable.

Barbaric

The problem of what to do with those who commit heinous crimes is a very difficult one to solve.

Is it?

No it isn't. Most countries have solved it. There's only a few that think the solution is to murder them.

True, but even harder to solve is the problem of bringing people back to life after being executed for crimes they didn't commit. The recent case of Peter Sullivan being just one example.

Ok - first I don't agree with the death penalty - can't undo it, bad enough keeping someone in prison who is wrongly convicted and I don't think we have the right to take a life.

For those states that have it as part of the law, it seems like this is a method that they're not competent at administering. I think there's a huge difference between removing someone's life and torturing them to death. Just like I'd support removing someone's liberty in prison if they've committed a crime but I wouldn't support having them beaten up every day.

Presumably people don't care if they don't have to see it (or maybe see it as retribution) and the criminal ends up dead sooner or later anyway so that's counted as successful?

I suppose because anybody who is receiving the lethal injection has committed horrific crimes, and have sometimes taken the lives of multiple people in horrendous ways, so nobody is particularly fighting for them to receive a dignified and pain free death themselves.

This.

randomchap · Today 11:59

Some states are looking at using a firing squad as an alternative to the injections due to the drugs being unavailable.

There have been firing squad executions this year. The last one had 3 shooters, one missed and the other 2 didn't hit his heart, he took quite a time to die.

For people who are happy when they suffer, the whole point is to be a bit better than them, so a quick, humane end is part of that.

No, I don't support the DP, even though some cases make me think twice.

I don't understand why if a state was that keen on lethal injection with a particular drug they could set up a state owned manufacturing plant that produced the necessary drugs. It can't be that hard to set up a plant to produce a single drug in low volume.

I am also surprised they don't import it from somewhere else as pretty much every country imports drugs from various places around the world.

Pets are not criminals!

To answer your original question, OP, I thought they did use an anaesthetic in the "cocktail" of drugs given, followed by a paralysing agent and then potassium chloride to stop the heart

However it's reported they're having trouble getting some of the drugs, so whether the anaesthetic's missed out now I couldn't say

@GasPanic i was thinking the same!

I suspect the real reason is the states that sanction this punishment really don’t care what fear or suffering occurs. And zero incentive to do anything about it. I remember being applied about finding out the death penalty was legal 35 years ago … nothing has improved.

Sometimes neither are people who are executed.

Yes. This.

Death row: The secret hunt for lethal drugs used in US executions - BBC News

This article from a couple of years ago explains some of the issues they have obtaining the drugs they use. It mentions at one point countries who do not support the death penalty either not allowing these companies to produce the drug there or allowing them to ship it, which is what I understood as one of the issues.

Thanks for the replies, it seems contention over the death penalty and supply of appropriate drugs, along with desire or willingness to cause suffering is the answer.

I just find it baffling that as societies, we can clearly euthanise easily & painlessly yet we can't manage this. (Using 'we' in it's widest possible sense, here)

When Britain had the death penalty, we had an incredibly efficient hangman, anyone know why hanging isn't used in the states?