USA: TEXAS GIVES VIRGINIA LETHAL DRUG FOR EXECUTIONS

September 25, 2015: In a filing Thursday in Oklahoma, lawyers provided evidence that Texas sold pentobarbital to Virginia in August. The state of Texas is making its own execution drugs and has sold them to at least one other death penalty state, an inmate facing execution in Oklahoma alleges in a court filing Thursday. His attorneys point to documents that show the Texas Department of Criminal Justice sold pentobarbital to Virginia in late August.
Pentobarbital is a sedative that many death penalty states have claimed is impossible for them to get their hands on. As a result, some states have turned to midazolam, a drug that critics argue is significantly less effective.
The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the use of midazolam in executions this June.
The records submitted as part of the new filing show that Virginia received 150 milligrams of the drug. Under the heading “Name of Supplier,” the Texas Department of Criminal Justice is listed. The labels do not identify the pharmacy that prepared the drug. However, the lawyers for the Oklahoma inmate state that the labels were created by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, which they also allege “is compounding or producing pentobarbital within its department for use in executions.” In the past, Texas has said that it obtains its execution drug “from a licensed pharmacy that has the ability to compound,” but would not name the pharmacy.
The lawyers raise these issues to make the argument that Oklahoma could avoid the use of the controversial midazolam drug in its executions. It could do so, they argue, by purchasing pentobarbital from Texas, like Virginia, or by “compounding or producing pentobarbital in the same manner as does TDCJ.”
States have struggled to obtain execution drugs for years after makers enacted more stringent guidelines to keep them away from states that would use them for executions. The idea of a state-run lab making its own death penalty drugs is something Missouri Attorney General Chris Koster raised last year, although many wondered how it could be done. Missouri, like Texas, has had no trouble obtaining pentobarbital. (Sources: BuzzFeed News, 25/09/2015)