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With the execution of a rapist-murderer recently postponed, experts and the public are questioning the way nearly three dozen states choose to put condemned inmates to death.

Lethal injection is the preferred method of execution in 35 of the 36 states that allow capital punishment. The review process following this postponement may take months and the case could very well end up before the United States Supreme Court.  Many opponents of the death penalty in California are hoping that this case ultimately produces a binding ruling that lethal injection is unconstitutionally cruel and unusual.

Before the execution of Michael Morales was to commence, a federal district judge in San Jose was asked to take a look into the death penalty in California. His duty, however, was not to rule whether or not lethal injection was unconstitutionally cruel or unusual. Judge Jeremy Fogel’s objective was to weigh evidence from previous executions in California and other states that the lethal injection leads to excruciating pain before death.

During the normal sequence of lethal drug injection, a barbiturate sedative is first administered to put the inmate to sleep, followed by a drug that paralyzes the muscles and stops the breathing, and a third chemical to stop the heart. What judge Fogel learned through autopsies and from witnesses was that the first drug might not be given properly or in an insufficient amount, leaving the inmate awake when the rest of the injections were given, causing great pain.

A day before Michael Morales was to be executed, Fogel demanded two things: (1) that the state use only barbiturates and not the ordinary three-drug potion to assure that the condemned man not suffer any undue pain and (2) that a medical expert supervise the injection of the drug.

Currently, a penitentiary employee performs the lethal injection while a doctor is only present to confirm the death. A doctor’s participation in the actual injection of the lethal drug is thought to be unethical by medical standards.

With only a day’s notice, the state of California was forced to postpone the execution because they could not comply with Judge Fogel’s new requirements.

Many legal scholars found that the judge’s ruling will lead to a fundamental review of California’s death penalty. It will not, according to many legal scholars, undermine the death penalty itself.

As condemned inmate Michael Morales sits and waits on death row again, federal courts are reviewing the practice of lethal injection in capital punishment. Judge Fogel has scheduled a May hearing where the state must show that the new methods are adequate enough to produce a painless death and that prison officials meticulously follow the new procedures.

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