AG's unique solution to dearth of execution drugs: State should manufacture its own supply
The Missouri attorney general has proposed a unique solution to a dearth of execution drugs.
His state, AG Chris Koster suggested to a bar association group on Thursday, should manufacture its own supply, the Kansas City Star reports.
If that occurs, Missouri would be the first state in the country to operate such a laboratory itself, executive director Richard Dieter of the Death Penalty Information Center told the newspaper. Dieter isn’t aware of any other official who has suggested doing so.
“For Missouri to maintain lethal injection as its preferred method of execution, it is my belief the legislature should remove market-driven participants and pressures from the system at the earliest opportunity,” Koster told a bar association group meeting at the Lake of the Ozarks. “Eliminating outside business interests from Missouri’s execution protocol would improve the high level of public transparency that is demanded in the exercise of this extraordinary state power.”
States throughout the country that apply the death penalty have found it difficult or impossible to get execution drugs in recent months because of the reluctance of pharmaceutical manufacturers and compounding pharmacies to involve themselves in the death penalty process.
Related coverage:
ABAJournal: “States keep mum on where lethal injection drugs are made”
ABAJournal.com: “Judge blocks sale of execution drug to Missouri”
