Inmates on death row in Tennessee were granted reprieve on Friday when Gov. Bill Lee announced that the state’s highest court will not reschedule executions, for now.
The Tennessee Supreme Court will wait for the state to finalize changes to its lethal injection process before it resumes issuing death warrants, Kimberlee Kruesi first reported for the Associated Press.
Lee’s announcement comes less than a month after an independent investigator released an 800-page report on Tennessee’s lethal injection protocol. It revealed the state has broken its protocol since it resumed executions in 2018.
“The report said that the state had abdicated its responsibility in making sure that these executions were being done properly and instead had forced basically the majority of the responsibility onto one single state employee,” said Kruesi during Friday’s episode of This Is Nashville.
Kruesi and AP reporter Jonathan Mattise also uncovered “that the protocol that the state has been using is extremely vague on how to store the (lethal injection) drugs, how far in advance should they be prepared.”
“Then we also found out that the pharmacy in charge of testing these drugs to make sure that they work was never handed the actual protocol,” Kruesi said.
Tennessee uses a three-drug cocktail during lethal injections that includes pentobarbital, which many pharmacies refuse to supply to death penalty states. In 2018, Tennessee considered contacting veterinarians for the drug since it is also used to euthanize animals.
“Ultimately, that did not go anywhere, but I think it shows the level of desperation,” said Kruesi. “At one point, they were considering going overseas.”
Even with pentobarbital, the state was warned that its three-drug protocol would cause bodily harm and violate prisoners’ Eighth Amendment right prohibiting cruel and unusual punishment.
Out of the seven men executed in Tennessee since 2018, only two have died from lethal injection. The other five opted for the electric chair, which death row inmates can choose if they were convicted before 1999.
With the lethal injection, “inmates are worried about how they would die and how they might experience pain. Electrocution is very fast. But, again, Tennessee is unique that we have this this option for our death row inmates,” said Kruesi.
Since the independent investigator released the report, Gov. Lee announced the Tennessee Department of Correction will make staffing changes at the leadership level and the new leadership will revise the lethal injection protocol.
“The governor feels pretty confident that the Supreme Court is going to wait until that protocol is finished being revised before they start renewing those death warrants. But it’s still to be determined on whether or not that will happen and how long those revisions will take place,” Kruesi said.
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