Post by Anja Nieser on Sept 11, 2006 18:46:10 GMT -5
Court documents detail execution delay----Anesthesiologist picked to serve as backup in lethal injection of Morales refused to participate despite court order
California's scheduled execution of Michael Angelo Morales, officially called off at 2:45 a.m. Feb. 21, was actually aborted more than six hours earlier, when an anesthesiologist was told of his court-ordered duties for the first time and responded, "I can't participate. I can't proceed."
Five days earlier, the state had filed a document in federal court stating that the backup anesthesiologist, now identified only as "A2," would "monitor (Morales) and provide the verification" that he was unconscious during the execution.
A U.S. District Court judge and then the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals accepted that assurance and permitted the execution preparations to move forward. But nobody had told A2, who was recruited with an understanding that he'd do nothing but serve as a "warm body."
The scenario unfolded Tuesday in a lengthy statement of the facts, filed jointly by the state attorney general's office and Morales' lawyers in preparation for a full-blown judicial review of California's lethal injection procedure.
Set to open Sept. 26 in federal court in San Jose before U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel, the hearing will revolve around whether the procedure presents an unacceptable risk of inflicting extreme pain in violation of the Eighth Amendment.
The focus will be on the qualifications of execution team members and the conditions under which they work.
In newly filed prehearing statements, Morales' lawyers contend executions are carried out under "unacceptable conditions" by prison staff "with criminal records of misconduct," who lack training in administering intravenous drugs and other essential personal and professional skills.
The Morales lawyers also say a former execution team leader was removed from that job and suspended from work for several months for misconduct unrelated to the carrying out of executions.
The contentions of criminal backgrounds and misconduct appear in a list of statements to which the state has objected, in most cases because of the "form of the statement" rather than the content.
The events that led to the postponement of the Morales execution last winter are described in a separate account of the facts to which both sides have agreed.
It reports that the backup anesthesiologist was first confronted with his duties at an execution rehearsal on Feb. 18. Stationed in an anteroom off the death chamber, he learned he was expected to signal when Morales was unconscious.
He refused to rehearse his assigned part and then obtained the warden's permission to stand farther away from the death chamber, in the room where drugs are mixed. He could merely "show up ... and stand in that little room," seeing nothing.
He didn't learn of the 9th Circuit order until he arrived at the prison Feb. 20 for the execution that had been scheduled for Feb. 21, a minute after midnight.
The 9th Circuit's Feb. 19 order permitting the execution to proceed accepted assurances by the state that 2 anesthesiologists would monitor Morales to make sure he was unconscious before the administration of potentially painful lethal drugs.
When A2 announced that he would not proceed, "Dr. (Robert) Singler concurred," according to the undisputed statement of facts. The reference apparently identifies for the first time the primary anesthesiologist assigned to the Morales execution, but does not make clear whether Singler also backed out or merely concurred with A2's decision to do so.
The Morales team hopes to put both doctors on the stand during the upcoming four-day hearing, but the attorney general has objected.
The undisputed facts include behind-the-scenes information about lethal injection executions that have occurred in California, particularly that of Stanley "Tookie" Williams.
One doctor at the Williams execution complained that he had been bumped by "some big fellow from Sacramento" in the cramped, darkened anteroom from which the execution team first sedates the inmate and then administers drugs to paralyze and, finally, to kill him. The drugs are administered through a long catheter that passes through the wall and into the death chamber.
The big Sacramentan would "block the light ... that helped to allow me to see what I'm doing," said Dr. Jack St. Clair, a prison physician who's scheduled to testify at the lethal injection hearing later this month.
According to Morales' lawyers, but disputed by the attorney general, "a large man" also stood in the way of a licensed vocational nurse whose job at Williams' execution was to select the right sequence of drugs from a cart.
Also asserted by the Morales' team but disputed by the state: The nurse responsible for setting 1 catheter in Williams blew the vein on the 1st 2 tries. After she failed a 3rd time, the warden gave the order: "Proceed."
(source: Sacramento Bee)
California's scheduled execution of Michael Angelo Morales, officially called off at 2:45 a.m. Feb. 21, was actually aborted more than six hours earlier, when an anesthesiologist was told of his court-ordered duties for the first time and responded, "I can't participate. I can't proceed."
Five days earlier, the state had filed a document in federal court stating that the backup anesthesiologist, now identified only as "A2," would "monitor (Morales) and provide the verification" that he was unconscious during the execution.
A U.S. District Court judge and then the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals accepted that assurance and permitted the execution preparations to move forward. But nobody had told A2, who was recruited with an understanding that he'd do nothing but serve as a "warm body."
The scenario unfolded Tuesday in a lengthy statement of the facts, filed jointly by the state attorney general's office and Morales' lawyers in preparation for a full-blown judicial review of California's lethal injection procedure.
Set to open Sept. 26 in federal court in San Jose before U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel, the hearing will revolve around whether the procedure presents an unacceptable risk of inflicting extreme pain in violation of the Eighth Amendment.
The focus will be on the qualifications of execution team members and the conditions under which they work.
In newly filed prehearing statements, Morales' lawyers contend executions are carried out under "unacceptable conditions" by prison staff "with criminal records of misconduct," who lack training in administering intravenous drugs and other essential personal and professional skills.
The Morales lawyers also say a former execution team leader was removed from that job and suspended from work for several months for misconduct unrelated to the carrying out of executions.
The contentions of criminal backgrounds and misconduct appear in a list of statements to which the state has objected, in most cases because of the "form of the statement" rather than the content.
The events that led to the postponement of the Morales execution last winter are described in a separate account of the facts to which both sides have agreed.
It reports that the backup anesthesiologist was first confronted with his duties at an execution rehearsal on Feb. 18. Stationed in an anteroom off the death chamber, he learned he was expected to signal when Morales was unconscious.
He refused to rehearse his assigned part and then obtained the warden's permission to stand farther away from the death chamber, in the room where drugs are mixed. He could merely "show up ... and stand in that little room," seeing nothing.
He didn't learn of the 9th Circuit order until he arrived at the prison Feb. 20 for the execution that had been scheduled for Feb. 21, a minute after midnight.
The 9th Circuit's Feb. 19 order permitting the execution to proceed accepted assurances by the state that 2 anesthesiologists would monitor Morales to make sure he was unconscious before the administration of potentially painful lethal drugs.
When A2 announced that he would not proceed, "Dr. (Robert) Singler concurred," according to the undisputed statement of facts. The reference apparently identifies for the first time the primary anesthesiologist assigned to the Morales execution, but does not make clear whether Singler also backed out or merely concurred with A2's decision to do so.
The Morales team hopes to put both doctors on the stand during the upcoming four-day hearing, but the attorney general has objected.
The undisputed facts include behind-the-scenes information about lethal injection executions that have occurred in California, particularly that of Stanley "Tookie" Williams.
One doctor at the Williams execution complained that he had been bumped by "some big fellow from Sacramento" in the cramped, darkened anteroom from which the execution team first sedates the inmate and then administers drugs to paralyze and, finally, to kill him. The drugs are administered through a long catheter that passes through the wall and into the death chamber.
The big Sacramentan would "block the light ... that helped to allow me to see what I'm doing," said Dr. Jack St. Clair, a prison physician who's scheduled to testify at the lethal injection hearing later this month.
According to Morales' lawyers, but disputed by the attorney general, "a large man" also stood in the way of a licensed vocational nurse whose job at Williams' execution was to select the right sequence of drugs from a cart.
Also asserted by the Morales' team but disputed by the state: The nurse responsible for setting 1 catheter in Williams blew the vein on the 1st 2 tries. After she failed a 3rd time, the warden gave the order: "Proceed."
(source: Sacramento Bee)