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 of death row inmate Clayton Lockett on Tuesday in Oklahoma is sparking a reassessment of lethal injection.


 Lockett's aborted execution and subsequent death by heart attack, along with ongoing controversies over the drugs used and how they are administered, "have begun a whole new phase in the decades-long struggle over capital punishment."


, referring not only to the execution of Lockett but to that of Ohio inmate Dennis McGuire, who in January took 24 minutes to die using a new cocktail of drugs, has brought up the issue of "whether using such drugs in executions constitutes 'cruel and unusual' punishment, in violation of the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution."


, death row inmates in different states have asked judges to delay their executions based on questions about lethal injection drugs. Some courts — including the U.S. Supreme Court — have refused to step in, and executions have proceeded.


, says it has become increasingly difficult to find trained medical personnel to carry out executions by lethal injection:


American Civil Liberties Union of Oklahoma

 called Lockett's execution attempt "a science experiment ... behind a veil of secrecy."
"We hope that courts will reconsider whether transparency about the drugs used in executions is required as a matter of law," the ACLU said in a statement issued late Tuesday. "After tonight, there's no speculation needed to appreciate that there are fundamental failures in our execution process."  Copyright 2019 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Crime, Law and Justice

Questions about the death penalty are being raised after the aborted execution and subsequent death of an Oklahoma inmate. The incident follows another botched execution in Ohio in January.

Botched executions fuel storm over lethal injection

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