Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

OH Inmate Took Twice As Long To Die

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • OH Inmate Took Twice As Long To Die

    Ohio inmate took twice as long to die
    It was the longest stretch of any of state’s executions since 1999, AP says
    The Associated Press
    Updated: 5:40 a.m. CT May 26, 2007

    COLUMBUS, Ohio - The 16 minutes it took Christopher Newton to die once chemicals began flowing into his veins was the longest stretch that any of the state’s inmates executed since 1999 has endured, an Associated Press review shows.

    During that span Thursday — more than twice as long as usual, and 5 minutes longer than the state’s previous longest on record — Newton’s stomach heaved, his chin quivered and twitched, and his 6-foot, 265-pound body twice mildly convulsed within the restraints.

    State prison records show that other Ohio inmates died within an average of 7 minutes, 30 seconds, and that the entire process typically takes about 20 minutes. The state did not compile that information for two inmates.

    The execution team at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville stuck Newton at least 10 times with needles to find suitable veins for the shunts where the chemicals are injected. He died nearly two hours after the scheduled start of his execution.

    ‘The whole thing seems agonizing’
    Newton’s unusual amount of movement and the time it took him to die raised new questions Friday among death penalty critics already alarmed by the problems that delayed his execution.

    “It seems too long,” Ohio State University surgeon Jonathan Groner said. “The whole thing seems agonizing.”

    Newton had insisted on the death penalty as punishment for choking and beating Jason Brewer, 27, his cellmate at the Mansfield Correctional Center, over a chess game in 2001.

    The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio asked the state Thursday to halt executions, but prison officials said Friday that Newton’s execution was properly handled and considered successful. They planned no investigation or autopsy.

    The second of three drugs should have paralyzed Newton rather than allowing the five minutes of movement witnesses to his execution could observe, Groner said.

    “That would suggest that the second drug of the three-drug protocol was not being effective,” he said. “It’s rapidly effective within 90 seconds. It paralyzes the muscles and stops the lungs.”

    Groner said the two minutes between the warden’s signal to start the chemicals and Newton appearing to lose consciousness, and the total time that elapsed before his death, also suggest that the chemicals may not have been flowing properly, or in the proper doses.

    Inmate’s size may have been a factor
    State prisons officials blocked out the doses of sodium pentothal, pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride in records provided Friday to the AP. Andrea Dean, a spokeswoman for the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction, said that she did not know whether doses are modified based on an inmate’s weight and that only the execution team knows dosage amounts.

    Newton’s obesity explains the difficulty in accessing his veins and the motion visible in the execution chamber, Dean said.

    “When Newton got to Lucasville, he told us himself that his veins sat really deep. We did checks and we saw veins,” said Dean, who was present during the execution. “He was thick, and his veins sat deep.”

    Dean said rules put in place after the botched execution of Joseph Clark last May, in which Clark sat up on the table to tell his executioners the process wasn’t working, give prison employees the ability to slow down and do a professional job.

    “The team took as much time as needed to find good veins,” she said. “In our mind, the process worked. There was no artificial time line to hurry up and find veins.”


    Carrie Davis, staff attorney for the ACLU of Ohio, said her group is gathering information on the execution and considering legal action.

    In Florida, after an unusually long delay in the Dec. 13 execution of Angel Diaz, 55, then-Gov. Jeb Bush created an 11-member panel to find out what had caused his death to take 34 minutes — twice as long as usual — and to recommend steps to prevent future delays that were similar. That panel has completed its work, and current Gov. Charlie Crist has allowed executions to resume.
    Linked Here
    "To dream of the person you would like to be is to waste the person you are."-Sholem Asch

    "I always turn to the sports page first, which records people's accomplishments. The front page has nothing but man's failures."-Earl Warren

    "I didn't intend for this to take on a political tone. I'm just here for the drugs."-Nancy Reagan, when asked a political question at a "Just Say No" rally

    "He no play-a da game, he no make-a da rules."-Earl Butz, on the Pope's attitude toward birth control

  • #2
    “It seems too long,” Ohio State University surgeon Jonathan Groner said. “The whole thing seems agonizing.”
    Pobrecito...I can only hope that it was as agonizing as it was for the man he choked to death.
    "To dream of the person you would like to be is to waste the person you are."-Sholem Asch

    "I always turn to the sports page first, which records people's accomplishments. The front page has nothing but man's failures."-Earl Warren

    "I didn't intend for this to take on a political tone. I'm just here for the drugs."-Nancy Reagan, when asked a political question at a "Just Say No" rally

    "He no play-a da game, he no make-a da rules."-Earl Butz, on the Pope's attitude toward birth control

    Comment


    • #3
      Yeah, isn't it funny how they left his crime outta the hole article?

      Freaking bleading heart morons.
      Facts to a liberal is like Kryptonite to Superman.

      -- Larry Elder

      Comment


      • #4
        Originally posted by THL View Post
        Pobrecito...I can only hope that it was as agonizing as it was for the man he choked to death.
        The victim is always the last thing on the minds of the "Do -Gooders"

        Comment


        • #5
          To bad he died so easy!

          Comment


          • #6
            Hanging has been called barbaric, but there is a long history of getting the rope length right for the weight of the condemned man. Surely to goodness medical science is sufficiently advanced to come up with a formula of the amount of poison necessary to kill people of any weight. A slow death may not disappoint too many WABbers, but think of how the witnesses and prison staff feel.
            Semper in excretum. Solum profunda variat.

            Comment


            • #7
              Think of the victims family as well, how do they feel about the details of the death of their loved one?

              The Humane way of killing a criminal would be to anesthetize him then inject him with the death dose of drugs.
              Facts to a liberal is like Kryptonite to Superman.

              -- Larry Elder

              Comment


              • #8
                Yes, a Massive overdose of the 3 chemicals required, no matter what the weight is, is the only way to ensure death in a "reasonable" time. If a vet can down an elephant with a dart full of drugs then surely the State can also get the amount required to dispose of an "outmate" correct

                Comment


                • #9
                  I've known cases where vets pumped enough sewage into a dog that would kill 3 elephants. My Belgian took 2 rounds to the head and required another 2 to the chest before it was finally put down. There's a photo here somewhere where an alligator clawed its way out from the inside of a boa constrictor.

                  Sometimes, things just refuse to die.

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Any anesthesiologist can tell you that people have different tolerances to medicine. That is why some people can down obscene amounts of alcohol and drive home while others can't stay on the bar stool after their second can of beer.

                    My vote is the guillotine. Cheap, Fast, effective and even a complete moron can use it. Bleeding idiots can whine about beining "cruel and unusual", but this really is a quick and relatively painless death. We don't have to listen to doctors cry about their "oath of hipocrites". Lastly, there is a reason why individuals are sentanced to death. As a society we should be symphathetic to the victims, not the vicious animal that did the crime.
                    Removing a single turd from the cesspool doesn't make any difference.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Sadly society, particularily here in North America has deteriorated to the point of not caring about victims anymore. Its all about the criminals and "how do we fix their major malfunction?"

                      Police can't take down a violent criminal in front of bystanders without those same bystanders claiming to witness an act of police brutality yet violent killers actually get out on bail and we assume they will behave.

                      If we want to put to death violent killers and be as humane as possible about it simply anesthetize them so they don't feel a thing then do the deed as quick as possible to ensure zero suffering, be it by guillotine or a leathal dose of drugs. In my opinion there are simply some individuals that cannot be cured of their sadistic and homicidal ways.
                      Facts to a liberal is like Kryptonite to Superman.

                      -- Larry Elder

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Originally posted by smilingassassin View Post
                        Yeah, isn't it funny how they left his crime outta the hole article?
                        What, this bit?
                        Newton had insisted on the death penalty as punishment for choking and beating Jason Brewer, 27, his cellmate at the Mansfield Correctional Center, over a chess game in 2001.
                        Originally posted by smilingassassin
                        The Humane way of killing a criminal would be to anesthetize him then inject him with the death dose of drugs.
                        The first of the three drugs administered is an anaesthetic. The second is a muscle relaxant (paralyses all muscles) and the third stops the heart. The second and third are considered an extremely painful way to go if given alone.

                        Originally posted by glyn
                        Surely to goodness medical science is sufficiently advanced to come up with a formula of the amount of poison necessary to kill people of any weight.
                        Originally posted by dave lukins
                        then surely the State can also get the amount required to dispose of an "outmate" correct
                        Originally posted by bonehead
                        We don't have to listen to doctors cry about their "oath of hipocrites".
                        Ummm... why do you guys think doctors got into the medical profession? There is a bit in the Hippocratic Oath that goes "To please no one will I prescribe a deadly drug nor give advice which may cause his death.". Do you think doctors should be willing to break an Oath, just to make your desire for revenge feel a bit less unwholesome? That bit of the Oath is clearly meant to prevent a doctor ever harming a patient, but just as clearly bans them from assisting with executions.
                        Incidentally, IIRC the selection and dosage of drugs used in modern US executions was scribbled down on the back of an envelope about 20 years ago, possibly even by a vet. It isn't something that a doctor spent a long time going over - with obvious consequences.
                        Rule 1: Never trust a Frenchman
                        Rule 2: Treat all members of the press as French

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          Why do we have this crappy system of executing people? Tie down the prisoner in front of a TV playing his favorite show. Give him some ice cream. Crank up the air conditioner. Seal the room. Fire up a charcoal BBQ. When the BBQ burns out, the prisoner will die. No pain. Cheap. Guaranteed death.
                          "Only Nixon can go to China." -- Old Vulcan proverb.

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Originally posted by pdf27 View Post
                            What, this bit?



                            The first of the three drugs administered is an anaesthetic. The second is a muscle relaxant (paralyses all muscles) and the third stops the heart. The second and third are considered an extremely painful way to go if given alone.




                            Ummm... why do you guys think doctors got into the medical profession? There is a bit in the Hippocratic Oath that goes "To please no one will I prescribe a deadly drug nor give advice which may cause his death.". Do you think doctors should be willing to break an Oath, just to make your desire for revenge feel a bit less unwholesome? That bit of the Oath is clearly meant to prevent a doctor ever harming a patient, but just as clearly bans them from assisting with executions.
                            Incidentally, IIRC the selection and dosage of drugs used in modern US executions was scribbled down on the back of an envelope about 20 years ago, possibly even by a vet. It isn't something that a doctor spent a long time going over - with obvious consequences.
                            Hmm. I was under the impression that the rules and regulations required a medical doctor to be in attendance at the execution of the order for capital punishment. Being there and NOT offering advice when such lack of advice could result in needless pain and suffering seems to be a particularly cruel act on the part of the MD and not in accordance with the rest of the oath.
                            Semper in excretum. Solum profunda variat.

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              Originally posted by glyn View Post
                              Hmm. I was under the impression that the rules and regulations required a medical doctor to be in attendance at the execution of the order for capital punishment. Being there and NOT offering advice when such lack of advice could result in needless pain and suffering seems to be a particularly cruel act on the part of the MD and not in accordance with the rest of the oath.
                              I'd have to check, but my understanding is that no doctors are present at US executions. This may explain, for instance, why they frequently have trouble finding veins for the needle.

                              Hmmm... googling it looks like rather a mixed bag - in some states they are banned, in others mandatory although frequently only used to certify death.
                              Executions halted as doctors balk
                              Rule 1: Never trust a Frenchman
                              Rule 2: Treat all members of the press as French

                              Comment

                              Working...
                              X