The Supreme Court released three opinions today, one day before the end of the term. Following last week’s headline-grabbing opinions on marriage and healthcare, the Court continued making news, issuing rulings on the Clean Air Act, electoral redistricting and, chief among the opinions, the lethal injection.

In the lethal injection case, Glossip v. Gross, the Court upheld the constitutionality of Oklahoma’s lethal injection program. Death row prisoners had challenged the state’s lethal injection cocktail, saying it failed to numb the pain of the lethal injection drugs, leading to a horrific death that would feel like being burnt alive. In their dissent, Justices Breyer and Ginsburg came out against the death penalty itself, arguing that capital punishment as a whole is unconstitutional.

The prisoners sought to enjoin Oklahoma’s use of the lethal injection cocktail, which is made of potassium chloride, pancuronium bromide, and midazolam. Together, these chemicals are meant accomplish a humane execution, with potassium chloride stopping the heart, pancuronium bromide paralyzing the prisoner, and midazolam anesthetizing him, preventing the executed inmate from feeling what would otherwise be excruciating pain.

The Majority’s Ruling

Midazolam was first used in executions after previous anesthetics were removed from the market. The fact that there exist so few alternatives to midazolam was, no pun intended, fatal. The Court, with Justice Alito writing and joined by Roberts, Scalia, Kennedy and Thomas, began by stating that the prisoners had failed to provide a “known and available alternative method,” as required by method-of-execution claims.

Second, the prisoner’s claims that midazolam carried an unconstitutional risk of harm was not established well enough, the majority ruled. The opinion emphasized the factual findings the district court made in initially upholding Oklahoma’s lethal injection cocktail. Evidence shows, the Court ruled, that an appropriate dose of midazolam will induce a coma. The prisoner’s claims to the contrary not were unpersuasive.

Breyer and Ginsburg Reject the Death Penalty Altogether

Justice Breyer’s dissent, and the two concurrences issued to respond to it, looked to the “more basic question: whether the death penalty violates the Constitution.” It does, Breyer argued, joined by Ginsburg. In a dissent that is sure to be taken up by death penalty opponents, Breyer asserted that the unreliable and arbitrary nature of capital punishment renders it unconstitutional.

Research shows that innocent people have been executed, Breyer says. The continued existence of exonerated death row inmates shows that the punishment cannot be reliably applied.

Related Resources:

  • Supreme Court Upholds Lethal Injection Procedure (The Washington Post)
  • SCOTUS Agrees to Hear Lethal Injection Case (FindLaw’s U.S. Supreme Court Blog)
  • DNA Sets Man Free After Scalia Mocked His Death Penalty Appeal (FindLaw’s U.S. Supreme Court Blog)
  • Briefs Come in for Oklahoma Lethal Injection Case (FindLaw’s U.S. Tenth Circuit Blog)

You Don’t Have To Solve This on Your Own – Get a Lawyer’s Help

Civil Rights

Block on Trump’s Asylum Ban Upheld by Supreme Court

Criminal

Judges Can Release Secret Grand Jury Records

Politicians Can’t Block Voters on Facebook, Court Rules