Death Penalty Stoppage Unplugging?
[Guest post by Aaron Worthing; if you have tips, please send them here.]
A while back Patterico noted that the death penalty was being slowed down in California by shortages in sodium thiopental, a drug that is part of the mix most commonly used in death penalty cases. Well, it turns out that in Arizona, they managed to get a fresh batch from a British company and tried to go forward with the execution of Jeffrey Landrigan. His crimes were described as follows:
In 1989, Landrigan escaped from an Oklahoma prison where he was serving time for second-degree murder.
He was convicted of strangling Chester Dyer in Arizona a year later during an armed burglary and was sentenced to death.
Pro-Death Penalty has alot more detail about both crimes the man committed. What leaps out at me was how forthright he was about the whole thing.
Nonetheless, his lawyers managed to get a last minute stay on the theory that this foreign-made drug might not be safe. They won in the District Court and then it was appealed to the Ninth Circuit. Do I have to tell you that the Ninth Circuit Affirmed? Yeah, they did. But the Supreme Court put a stop to all of this silliness with a singe page order saying:
There is no evidence in the record to suggest that the drug obtained from a foreign source is unsafe. The district court granted the restraining order because it was left to speculate as to the risk of harm…. But speculation cannot substitute for evidence that the use of the drug is “‘sure or very likely to cause serious illness and needless suffering.’”… There was no showing that the drug was unlawfully obtained, nor was there an offer of proof to that effect.
This suggests there is some hope in California to see the de facto moratorium on executions end. We can hope.
Also, the LA Times notes that this is Elena Kagan’s first vote, most likely meaning the first public and final vote in a Supreme Court case. She dissented along with the predictable gang. It was a 5-4 decision.
[Posted and authored by Aaron Worthing.]
LOL — California executions will be a thing of the past next Wed if Brown prevails.
He’s got nothing in his future after Gov. Thre won’t be a single execution at any point after he is elected.
shipwreckedcrew (58dde3) — 10/28/2010 @ 2:23 pmship
actually, you might be right.
which is wrong, morally. he should just obey the law, but…
that doesn’t mean he will.
Aaron Worthing (e7d72e) — 10/28/2010 @ 2:25 pmIt is so bizarre that we’re quibbling over the safety of how we kill people.
I can understand trying to execute people humanely, but an absolutely painless euphoria seems unreasonable. You can’t actually kill them with kindness… you have to do some degree of violence to their body.
Judges talking to judges about standards they never asked the voters about. Voters who are OK with the electric chair.
Dustin (b54cdc) — 10/28/2010 @ 2:33 pmAfter Baze, how do you get a 5-4 decision. Under normal surgery, the likelihood of feeling any pain in virtually impossible – there may be pain, but nearly impossible to feel since you are unconcious. You are given 20x the amount of drug to make you unconsious.
A bigger issue is how you get 4 votes to sustain the stay
Joe (6120a4) — 10/28/2010 @ 2:43 pmThis is really idiotic. The left wants everyone to use medications imported into this country because that will ruin the drug companies. But, they are concerned that someone who has 24 minutes to live may get sick.
What idiots!
Let’s hope that with a senate split 50-50, or very close, the repubs won’t allow another sotomayer or kagen nominee to make it. They need to Bork some of these socialists.
After all the other devastating things o has done to tear down the country and ruin the economy, we don’t need a court with 3 of those type of idiots.
Jim (844377) — 10/28/2010 @ 2:52 pmI think what happened to Bork was quite wrong, and yet the Senate is not functional unless both sides treat eachother the same way. I’m tired of Obama trying to Bork great jurists like Roberts and Alito because they don’t adhere to his ideology, while ramming through ideologues.
They should go ahead and reject any progressive jurist nominated on the “Obama rule”. They are going to be called obstructionists no matter what they do, anyway.
Dustin (b54cdc) — 10/28/2010 @ 2:58 pmThe four dissenters are unbelievable. We are one Supreme Court Justice away from uber-legislating from the bench.
norcal (193e31) — 10/28/2010 @ 3:09 pmI remember during confirmation hearings for either Sotomayer or Kagan that the nominee was not as bad as other possible Obama nominees.
On which types of issues might one of them be expected to venture away from the liberal wing of the Court?
Dick (69b3db) — 10/28/2010 @ 4:23 pmI remember during confirmation hearings for either Sotomayer or Kagan that the nominee was not as bad as other possible Obama nominees.
On which types of issues might one of them be expected to venture away from the liberal wing of the Court?
aunursa (69b3db) — 10/28/2010 @ 4:24 pmAunursa, none. Both are hard line ideologues. They only benefit is that they are so rigid they are unlikely to sway Kennedy. Both Kagan and Sotomayor are said to have overbearing attitudes.
My take is a progressive who wasn’t a bully might be better in years to come, and at any rate, if we can’t defeat these ‘worse’ nominees, we probably couldn’t defeat these ‘better’ ones. Fight them using the ‘Obama rule’, which according to Obama, is to vote against qualified jurists if they aren’t ideologically agreeing with you.
If the democrats don’t like that rule, they can show us that for a few years before we revert.
Dustin (b54cdc) — 10/28/2010 @ 4:33 pmWhy do executions take longer in California than Virginia? Is it because of a state law difference? (I know that they are both governed by the same federal laws.)
Michael Ejercito (249c90) — 10/28/2010 @ 5:54 pm5.This is really idiotic. The left wants everyone to use medications imported into this country because that will ruin the drug companies. But, they are concerned that someone who has 24 minutes to live may get sick. – Comment by Jim —
I think this just goes to show that often people want what they want and will find a reason to justify it. So much for legal scholarship.
MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 10/28/2010 @ 5:55 pm@ Michael Ejercito,
Why do executions take longer in California than Virginia?
I was reading an article discussing the utter dysfunction of California and the death penalty as compared to other states. And not surprising, the 9th Circuit Court is mentioned as having a hand in the problem.
Researchers who both advocate and oppose capital punishment agree that, in California, implementing the death penalty has become a disaster.
“It’s a broken system,” said Richard Dieter, a director of the Death Penalty Information Center in Washington, D.C. “It’s broken in the sense that it’s very expensive and very time-consuming. California has the most expensive form of life without parole.”
Michael Rushford, the president and CEO of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation in Sacramento, agreed. “Compared to other death penalty states, the length of time (between sentencing and execution) is double, triple that of other states,” he said, adding that the system has “absolutely” been set up to fail. “There’s a symbiotic relationship between the 65 percent of state legislators who oppose the death penalty and the 9th Circuit Court.”
Dana (8ba2fb) — 10/28/2010 @ 7:04 pmThe difference between Calif and Virginia is both at the state court level and the federal court level.
California sends all capital cases immediately to the Supreme Court, skipping intermediate appeal. That means every issue that a defendant can raise will be raised in the Supreme Court in the first instance. Given California’s size, this has created a huge backlog of cases.
Then, after finishing the state appellate process, the defendant heads for federal habeas review.
The biggest problem at the federal level is the lack of meaningful deadlines for courts to made decisions. Federal habeas cases in capital crimes can drag on for years in the district and appellate court levels. The 9th Circuit will sit on a decision for years before issuing a reversal on some issue, and sending the case back to the state for further proceedings consistent with tis opinion.
Virginia, on the other hand, has state courts that operate much more effeciently, and the federal courts in the 4th Circuit would never allow cases to linger the way 9th Circuit judges are comfortable with.
shipwreckedcrew (58dde3) — 10/28/2010 @ 7:12 pmThe only ways in which Sotomayor and Kagan were not the “worst” nominees one could expect from Obama is that neither has any real reputation as Constitutional scholars. They will have little reputational heft in the court and are not expected to actually be able to lead anyone in the court anywhere.
SPQR (26be8b) — 10/28/2010 @ 7:53 pmA while back Patterico noted that the death penalty was being slowed down in California by shortages in sodium thiopental, a drug that is part of the mix most commonly used in death penalty cases.
No, the death penalty in CA is being slowed down by some idiot Clinton appointee named Jeremy Fogel.
Blacque Jacques Shellacque (609d83) — 10/29/2010 @ 1:26 amNYT has an editorial about the Landrigan execution, and how awful the death penalty is. I wonder if their editorialists knew that Landrigan’s last victim was gay? I guess that in the liberal press, only _some_ gay victims are lionized, while others are forgotten.
gp (72be5d) — 10/29/2010 @ 6:34 amThe Left keeps saying that “the Court is just one vote away from banning abortion” (even though the vote count is 6-3 in favor of the current mandate).
But what is clear is that the Court is only one vote away from ending the death penalty, gutting the second amendment, regulating political speech and, of course, allowing Congress to regulate any and all activities of life directly, the Constitution be damned.
Sure hope no one gets taken ill in the next two years.
Kevin M (298030) — 10/29/2010 @ 9:10 amA drug that is meant to cause death can’t be used if it causes ‘serious illness’? What illness is more serious than death?
eaglewingz08 (74f660) — 10/29/2010 @ 12:16 pm