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Ohio drops 2-drug lethal injection method, delays execution

State prisons agency also said it will again allow the use of an anesthetic that it used from 1999 through 2011

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These undated file photos provided by the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections show death row inmates Ronald Phillips and Raymond Tibbetts.

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By Andrew Welsh-Huggins
Associated Press

COLUMBUS, Ohio — The state said Thursday that it’s dropping the two-drug combination administered to an inmate who repeatedly gasped and snorted during a troubling 26-minute execution.

The state prisons agency also said it will again allow the use of an anesthetic that it used from 1999 through 2011.

The announcement that it’s adding thiopental sodium back to the execution policy immediately raised questions of where the state would obtain such a drug.

In 2011, the Department of Rehabilitation and Correction switched to pentobarbital when the manufacturer restricted thiopental sodium’s distribution, making it impossible to obtain for executions.

As part of Thursday’s announcement, the state said the Feb. 11 execution of a condemned child killer is being delayed as the agency secures supplies of the new drug.

The state said in addition to delaying the execution of Ronald Phillips, set to die for the 1993 rape and killing of his girlfriend’s 3-year-old daughter, other executions might also be delayed.

Gov. John Kasich will issue a reprieve for Phillips and possibly other death row inmates once options for future execution dates are determined and depending on the availability of execution drugs, said spokesman Rob Nichols.

Death penalty experts immediately questioned where Ohio would find supplies of thiopental sodium, saying it’s no longer available in the U.S. and overseas imports would run afoul of importing bans.

“Presumably Ohio is acquiring thiopental from a compounding pharmacy since the drug can no longer be purchased from international sources,” said Deborah Denno, a Fordham University law professor and lethal injection expert.

The state is trying to find sources of both drugs, said JoEllen Smith, prisons spokeswoman. “All sources of the drugs permitted by the policy are being explored,” she said Thursday.

State public defender Tim Young, whose office defends many death row inmates, applauded the removal of the two-drug combo but said Ohio has changed its policy too often in recent years and should take a hard look at the entire capital punishment system.

Ohio was the first state to use the combination of midazolam, a powerful sedative, and hydromorphone, a painkiller, when it executed Dennis McGuire a year ago.

What transpired was the state’s longest execution, a 26-minute procedure during which McGuire made gasping and snorting sounds. McGuire’s adult children have sued the state over the execution, saying their father endured needless pain and suffering.

Arizona also used the same two-drug combination in a July execution that lasted nearly two hours, far longer than executions normally take.

Ohio had to change its drug policy soon. The state’s remaining supply of midazolam and hydromorphone expires this spring, meaning the prisons agency wouldn’t have been able to carry out executions after March without new supplies, The Associated Press reported earlier Thursday.

Under the new policy, Ohio plans to use a dose of either pentobarbital or thiopental sodium in executions.

With Phillips’ execution on hold, Ohio still has executions scheduled in March, May, July, September and November.

Kasich signed a bill into law last month that would shield the names of companies providing lethal drugs to Ohio. The goal of the bill is to make it easier to obtain compounded pentobarbital, the state’s first choice for executions but which it hasn’t been able to find.

Missouri and Texas have supplies of compounded pentobarbital and have used the drug successfully in several recent executions.

Four death row inmates have sued over the new law, saying it restricts information that helps inform the public debate over capital punishment.

One of those inmates, Raymond Tibbetts, is scheduled to die March 12 for the 1997 fatal stabbing of Fred Hicks in Cincinnati.

Copyright 2015 The Associated Press

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