US court won't decide lethal injection challenge

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court on Monday declined to decide whether a chemical cocktail used to execute convicted murderers violates the US Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment, clearing the way for the practice to continue.

The justices refused to hear the appeal by a Tennessee death row inmate who said one of the drugs may inflict inhumane pain and that 30 states, including his own, have banned using it for the euthanasia of animals.

The high court at the end of April heard arguments in a similar case from Florida on whether death row inmates can bring a last-minute challenge to the lethal injection method under a federal civil rights law. A decision in that, narrower, Florida case is expected by the end of June.

The court rejected the Tennessee appeal without comment.

All but one of the US states with the death penalty and the federal government use lethal injection for executions. Nebraska alone requires electrocution.

The standard method involves administering three separate drugs: sodium pentothal, an anesthetic, which makes the inmate unconscious; pancuronium bromide, which paralyzes all muscles except the heart; and then potassium chloride, which stops the heart, causing death.

Attorneys for the Tennessee death row-inmate, Abu-Ali Abdur'Rahman, argued the anesthetic could fail and the second drug could cause the inmate to feel intense pain, but he would be unable to show it because his muscles are paralyzed.

The state's execution procedures "needlessly create the prospect of torturing the inmate to death", they said, and failed to protect against unnecessary suffering.

Seventeen Tennessee medical professionals supported Abdur'Rahman's appeal. They cited the lack of adequate training in the field of anesthesiology for those who administer the drug combination.

The Tennessee Supreme Court ruled last year that the state's method of execution does not violate the Constitution, which bars "cruel and unusual punishment".

Tennessee Attorney General Paul Summers also said the state court properly applied US Supreme Court precedent in concluding the lethal injection protocol does not violate contemporary standards of decency and does not inflict unnecessary pain and suffering.

Abdur'Rahman was sentenced to death for the 1986 murder of Patrick Daniels, a Nashville drug dealer, during an armed robbery. He repeatedly stabbed Daniels in the chest while Daniels pleaded for his life.

- REUTERS