Oklahoma Supreme Court

Okla. Supreme Court halts execution in a last minute decision

April 21, 2014

One day before Clayton Lockett was scheduled to be executed for the 1999 shooting death of 19-year-old Stephanie Nieman, a sharply divided Oklahoma Supreme Court granted a stay.

The decision also includes a second inmate, Charles Warner, who was convicted in the 1997 death of his roommate’s 11-month-old daughter.

He was scheduled to die on April 29.

The two death row inmates have challenged the secrecy surrounding the source of the state’s lethal injection drugs.

The decision was 5-4.

Last month, Oklahoma County District Judge Patricia Parrish struck down the state’s execution law.

The ruling said the protocol prevented the inmates from seeking information about the drugs used in lethal injections and that violated their rights under the state constitution.

The state changed its execution protocol on March 21 to allow five different potential drug combinations for execution by lethal injection.

The state informed lawyers for the inmates on April 1 that the inmates would be executed using a combination of midazolam, pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride never before used in the state.

Executions have been conducted using the drug combination in Florida with lower doses.

The request filed by the convicts attorney says the inmates “have received no certifications, testing data, medical opinions or other evidence to support the state’s insistence that these drugs are safe, or to prove that they were acquired legally.”

Oklahoma and other states that have the death penalty have been scrambling for substitute drugs or new sources for drugs for lethal injections after major drug companies — many based in Europe with longtime opposition to the death penalty — stopped selling to prisons and corrections departments.

On Friday, the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals denied the inmates’ request for a stay in spite of a ruling by the Supreme Court earlier in the week that the appeals court had the authority

 

Oklahoma Justices Send Execution Case To Lower Court

April 18, 2014

Clayton Lockett and Charles Warner have sued the state seeking more information about the drugs that would be used to kill them.

The Oklahoma Supreme Court says it is not the place for death-row inmates to go if they want a stay of execution.

Justices said Thursday that the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals should take up stay requests from 2 inmates scheduled to die in the next 2 weeks. The appeals court had said previously it didn’t have the authority because the inmates hadn’t met all technical requirements under the law.

Clayton Lockett and Charles Warner have sued the state seeking more information about the drugs that would be used to kill them. They say they need stays of execution so they can continue their challenge.

The justices wrote that the Court of Criminal Appeals erred in not taking up the request.

Death penalty abolitionists and others who seek to end the death penalty will protest the executions of two death-row inmates on the days of their executions.

The Oklahoma Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty will host “Don’t Kill for Me” demonstrations at the governor’s mansion followed by silent vigils on Tuesday for death-row inmate Clayton Lockett and on April 29 for Charles Warner.

The inmates have been in a legal battle with the state over the secrecy surrounding which drugs are used in executions and their origins. The executions are still scheduled to take place, despite pending litigation in the case.

Lockett was found guilty of the 1999 shooting death of a 19-year-old woman, Stephanie Nieman. Warner was convicted for the 1997 death of his roommate’s 11-month-old daughter.

(source: Associated Press)

2 Oklahoma death row inmates seek stay for appeal

march 11, 2014

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Lawyers for two Oklahoma death row inmates on Tuesday asked the Oklahoma Supreme Court for a stay of execution while their lawsuit makes its way through state court.

Attorneys for Clayton Lockett and Charles Warner simultaneously filed an appeal and an emergency application for a stay of execution to the state’s highest court, writing the inmates “will suffer irreparable harm” if a stay is not granted. Oklahoma County District Judge Patricia Parrish on Monday denied their request to halt the executions that are scheduled for later this month.

Parrish denied the request on grounds that the case was not under her jurisdiction. Lockett and Warner sued the Oklahoma Department of Corrections last month, challenging a law that bars disclosure of the state’s execution procedures.

“At Monday’s hearing, the State all but admitted it is now using compounded pentobarbital to carry out executions, but it continues to refuse to provide any information about the source of that drug,” Madeline Cohen, an assistant federal public defender said in an email.

Lockett is scheduled to die March 20 and Warner on March 27. They are not challenging their convictions but are asking for a temporary restraining order to prevent their executions until they know more about the lethal injection drugs to be used.

The Oklahoma Attorney General’s Office will respond to the appeal to the Oklahoma Supreme Court by noon on Wednesday, a spokeswoman said.