Alabama executes Jason Oric Williams

Jason Oric Williams

ATMORE, Ala. (AP) — An Alabama man was executed Thursday for the deaths of four people in a 1992 shooting spree.

Corrections officials said 42-year-old Jason Oric Williams died at 6:19 p.m. CDT following a lethal injection administered at Holman Prison in Atmore.

Williams became the first person to die in Alabama's death chamber since the state switched to pentobarbital instead of sodium thiopental in its execution cocktail. The state switched drugs because of a nationwide shortage of sodium thiopental.

Williams was convicted in the Feb. 15, 1992, deaths of Gerald Paravicini and his neighbors. Freddie Barber and Barber's wife, Linda, and their grown son Bryant. Court records show Williams claimed he was high on marijuana, LSD, crack cocaine and alcohol at the time.

Source: AP, May 19, 2011

Jason Oric Williams executed for 1992 murders

ATMORE, Ala. -- Jason Oric Williams smiled at his weeping mother and asked forgiveness for killing four people before he died by lethal injection at 6:19 p.m. today.

Williams, who turned 43 one day earlier, was the first inmate in Alabama to be executed using pentobarbital in the state's three-drug lethal injection. The state was forced to change the drug after a shortage of sodium thiopental across the U.S.

"I hope that the families of the victims forgive me for what I've done," Williams said as he lay strapped to a bed.

Williams killed four people and injured three others during a shooting rampage in south Mobile County in the early morning hours of Feb. 15, 1992.

Gerald Paravicini, 46, Freddie Barber, 50, Linda Barber, 45, and Bryan Barber, 22, were shot and killed in their homes off Padgett Switch Road about 6 a.m.

Ten family members of the victims -- including one man who survived being shot -- witnessed the execution at Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore, a spokesman said.

In another viewing room, Williams' mother and aunt looked on after a day of visiting him in prison. A minister who works with death row inmates also sat with Williams' family.

He was pronounced dead at 6:19 p.m.

Williams made no special request for a final meal from the prison. He ate chicken wings and sandwiches that his family bought from vending machines in a prison visitation area, a corrections department spokesman said.

Drug use challenged

Lundbeck: 'Our drug kills, so what?'

Defense lawyers for Williams challenged the use of pentobarbital, arguing that it hasn't been proven to cease consciousness or otherwise stop the ability to lose pain. His lawyers that that violated the constitutional ban against cruel and unusual punishment.

Williams, then 23, claimed he was high on crack cocaine and LSD and had been drinking alcohol when he returned to the Paravicini's trailer home, where he had been temporarily living.

After talking to his estranged wife on the phone, Williams grabbed a .22-caliber rifle and began firing at Paravicini. He then beat Paravicini's wife with the gun and shot her 16-year-old son in the face, according to Press-Register archives. The mother and son survived and later testified in court.

Williams then walked to the Barber family's brick house about 200 yards away. He fired at Linda Barber, who was getting ready for work at the U.S. Postal Service, and Freddie Barber, who was drinking coffee in the kitchen, according to archives.

He walked into a bedroom and shot the couple's 22-year-old as he slept. A younger brother, 16-year-old Brad Barber, was shot in the hand before he ran away.

Williams, a ninth-grade dropout, drove away in the family's vehicle and turned up a day later when he called his wife from a pay phone in Mississippi, where he agreed to wait for police and surrender.

After the execution, Williams' family members did not make any statements to news reporters.

During a 1992 sentencing hearing, Williams' mother, Patricia Neal, asked a jury not to recommend the death penalty.

"I just blame me because I was not a mother to my son like I should have been," she said. "Please don't kill my son."

Williams becomes the 3rd condemned inmate to be put to death this year in Alabama and the 52nd overall since the state resumed capital punishment in 1983.

Williams becomes the 18th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in the USA and the 1252nd overall since the nation resumed executions on January 17, 1977. There are 2 more executions set for next week, in Mississippi and in Arizona; there are 8 executions set nationwide in June.

Source: al.com, Rick Halperin, May 19, 2011


Related article: "Alabama to carry out first execution using Lundbeck drugs", Reprieve, May 19, 2011
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Alabama to carry out first execution using Lundbeck drugs

Lundbeck: "Yes, our drug kills!"

Alabama is today set to execute its first prisoner using drugs produced by Danish pharmaceutical company Lundbeck.

Jason Williams will be killed using the barbiturate pentobarbital, after US shortages of previously-used drugs led Alabama to switch. Copenhagen-headquartered firm Lundbeck is the sole supplier of this drug – also known as Nembutal – to death rows in America.

Alabama is the latest in an increasingly long line of states to start using pentobarbital for executions as a result of shortages of the anaesthetic sodium thiopental. Williams will be the 11th person in the US executed with Lundbeck drugs.

Legal action charity Reprieve has asked Lundbeck to take action to prevent its drugs from being used in this way. While Lundbeck claims to be strongly opposed to the use of its products in executions, the firm has yet to explain adequately why it cannot do more to put a stop to it. In Williams’ case, Lundbeck refused to submit an ‘amicus curiae’ brief to the court specifically stating its opposition to the use of pentobarbital in his execution, and raising concerns over the use of the product for purposes for which it was not intended.

Reprieve Investigator Maya Foa said:

“Lundbeck are fast becoming better known for ending lives than for improving them.

“Aside from moral concerns, this is damaging their reputation as a business – one investor recently sold their shares and others are asking questions.

“Lundbeck should exit the execution drug market immediately if they want to salvage their reputation.”

1. For further information please contact Donald Campbell in Reprieve's press office on +44 (0)20 7427 1082 / (0)7791 755 415

2. Reprieve previously asked Lundbeck to submit an amicus curiae (‘friend of the court) brief, providing a suggested draft, but the firm declined. http://www.reprieve.org.uk/2011_05_12_Lundbeck_refuses_amicus

3. Reprieve has suggested a range of possible courses of action to Lundbeck to put a stop to the use of its drugs in executions – a briefing on the issue can be found here: http://www.reprieve.org.uk/static/downloads/2011_05_12_PUB_NEMBUTAL_DISTRIBUTION_BRIEFING.pdf

4. Alabama will become the sixth US state to have carried out executions using Lundbeck’s pentobarbital. The other states and the names of those executed so far are as follows:

Mississippi: Benny Stevens, Rodney Gray

Oklahoma: John David Duty, Billy Don Alverson, Jeffrey Matthews

Ohio: Johnnie Baston, Clarence Carter, Daniel Bedford

South Carolina: Jeffrey Motts

Texas: Cary Kerr

5. Danish pension fund Unipension recently sold their shares in Lundbeck, citing concerns over their use in executions and the company’s unwillingness to engage with investors on the issue. Unipension told the Associated Press: "It has not been possible for Unipension to get a detailed report regarding Lundbeck's efforts to ensure that its products are not used in an unwanted manner […] It has been our impression that Lundbeck did not want to engage in a genuine dialogue with us as an investor."

http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2011/05/13/general-eu-denmark-execution-drug_8465488.html

Reprieve, a legal action charity, uses the law to enforce the human rights of prisoners, from death row to Guantánamo Bay. Reprieve investigates, litigates and educates, working on the frontline, to provide legal support to prisoners unable to pay for it themselves. Reprieve promotes the rule of law around the world, securing each person’s right to a fair trial and saving lives. Clive Stafford Smith is the founder of Reprieve and has spent 27 years working on behalf of people facing the death penalty in the USA.

Reprieve

PO Box 52742

London EC4P 4WS

Tel: 020 7353 4640

Fax: 020 7353 4641

Email: info@reprieve.org.uk

Website: www.reprieve.org.uk


Related article: "Pentobarbital: The Irreversible Cure", The Pentobarbital Experiment, May 19, 2011

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Death row lawyers question competence of lethal injection drug supplier

Lawyers for a US death row prisoner have called for his execution not to go ahead due to serious questions over how the drugs set to be used were imported, and the competence and credibility of their supplier.

A motion filed by Carey Dean Moore’s lawyers in Nebraska asserts that the state’s Department of Correctional Services (DCS) did not obtain the execution drug sodium thiopental from a manufacturer approved by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

It also questions whether the drug supplier's personnel “have the level of competence, professionalism and credibility to be DCS’ source of one of the essential lethal drugs”, in the light of abusive emails between the firm’s director and other staff following an internal dispute.

The Director of India-based Kayem Pharma, which supplied the sodium thiopental, has described his former US colleagues who were in direct contact with Nebraska’s DCS as “drug peddlers” in emails to Moore’s lawyers. Kayem’s former US personnel have sent the Director emails referring to him as a “piece of shit thief”.

Reprieve Investigator Sophie Walker said:

“It is hard to see how Nebraska’s department of corrections can defend the use of these drugs in executions.

“Not only were they improperly imported – but they were bought by Nebraska from people described as ‘drug peddlers’ by one of their own colleagues.

“The revelation of chaotic and abusive relations between Kayem Pharma’s US and Indian personnel casts serious doubt over their competence.

“If Nebraska now pushes ahead with executions using these drugs, it risks irreparably damaging its credibility.”

Source: Reprieve, May 18, 2011

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Ohio executes Daniel Lee Bedford

Daniel Lee Bedford

LUCASVILLE, Ohio (AP) — The state on Tuesday executed a man who said he didn't remember fatally shooting his ex-girlfriend and her boyfriend at the woman's Cincinnati apartment in 1984.

Daniel Lee Bedford, 63, became the third inmate in Ohio and the nation to be put to death using the surgical sedative pentobarbital as a stand-alone execution drug. He was pronounced dead at 11:18 a.m.

Bedford's attorneys pushed to block the lethal injection in a last-minute legal battle. They argued Bedford had dementia and a mild mental disability and wasn't competent enough to understand why he was being executed. They also said he was denied legal proceedings to which he was entitled.

Prosecutors challenged the idea that Bedford wasn't competent and successfully appealed a stay of execution issued Monday by a federal judge.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday refused the defense's request to block the execution.

Bedford is the fourth Ohio inmate put to death this year.

He was sentenced to death after confessing to authorities that he shot Gwen Toepfert, 25, and John Smith, 27, at Toepfert's Cincinnati apartment, apparently because he was jealous after finding the couple there several days before the slayings.

Bedford learned from Toepfert's roommate that the couple were home and waited at the apartment where, armed with a revolver and a shotgun, he killed Smith and shot Toepfert multiple times before returning to her body and firing a shotgun blast into her groin to be sure she was dead, prosecutors said.

Bedford told the state parole board in March he didn't remember the slayings but that his attorneys had told him details and he was "sorry it happened."

Relatives of Toepfert and Smith expressed support for the execution, saying they believe the killings were merciless and Bedford knew what he was doing.

Gov. John Kasich denied clemency, and the Ohio Supreme Court also refused to block the execution, rejecting the defense's arguments about Bedford's competency.

Bedford becomes the 4th condemned inmate in Ohio to be put to death this year and the 45th overall since the state resumed capital punishment in 1999.

Bedford becomes the 16th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in the USA and the 1250th overall since the nation resumed executions on January 17, 1977. There are 4 more executions scheduled in the US this month and 7 more in June.

Source: AP, Rick Halperin, May 17, 2011

Related article: "Brain-damaged man to be executed using Lundbeck’s neurological treatment drugs", Reprieve, May 16, 2011
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Brain-damaged man to be executed using Lundbeck’s neurological treatment drugs

A man with grave neurological disorders is scheduled to be executed tomorrow [Tuesday] with drugs that should be used to treat him.

Ohio is set to execute 63 year-old Danny Lee Bedford - who suffers from seizures, strokes and brain trauma - using a massive overdose of a drug made by Danish firm Lundbeck and originally developed for the treatment of seizures.

The range of disorders afflicting Danny severely impairs his neurological functioning. Unable to carry out simple tasks or comprehend and retain information, he has no memory of the crime for which he has been condemned and is incapable of understanding the punishment.

Legal action charity Reprieve is asking Lundbeck’s CEO to write urgently to Ohio’s Governor in support of a petition filed by Danny’s lawyers which states that his neurological condition renders him incompetent to be executed. Reprieve is also asking that CEO Ulf Wiinberg uses Lundbeck’s expertise to confirm Bedford’s neurological deficiencies and detail the treatment he should be receiving for them. As leaders in the field of neurology and psychiatry, Lundbeck are well placed to diagnose and prescribe treatment for Danny; and as manufacturers of the drug that Ohio DOC intend to use to kill him, their contribution to his legal case will be crucial.

Reprieve’s Director, Clive Stafford Smith said: “Lundbeck's mission is ‘to improve the quality of life for those suffering from psychiatric and neurological disorders’, but they are quickly gaining a reputation for ending lives rather than improving them. Lundbeck should exit the execution drug market immediately lest all of their noble claims be revealed to be meaningless.”

1. For further information please contact Donald Campbell in Reprieve's press office on +44 (0)20 7427 1082 / (0)7791 755 415

2. Danny Lee Bedford has been on death row for nearly three decades. He is borderline mentally retarded and suffers from dementia. Last week, his lawyers filed a Ford petition claiming that his vast array of neurological disorders render him incompetent to be executed. Reprieve has asked Lundbeck CEO, Ulf Wiinberg, to send a letter supporting the Ford petition to Ohio’s Governor Kasich, outlining Danny’s neurological deficiencies and detailing the treatment he should be given.

3. Reprieve wrote to Ulf Wiinberg asking Lundbeck to provide an urgent mental health assessment of Danny Lee Bedford on 13th May - the letter can be found here: http://www.reprieve.org.uk/static/downloads/2011_05_13_PUB_CSS_to_Lundbeck.pdf

Reprieve also wrote today to ask Lundbeck to supply drugs which would improve his quality of life, rather than end it - the letter can be found here: http://www.reprieve.org.uk/static/downloads/2011_05_16_PUB_CSS_to_Lundbeck.pdf

4. Daniel Bedford will be the 9th person to be executed using Lundbeck's pentobarbital. Ohio was the one of the first states to change their lethal injection protocol to Lundbeck's drug, and the only one so far to have opted to use it alone rather than in the three-drug cocktail. To date, over two-thirds of states with active death chambers have now switched their lethal injection protocol to Lundbeck's pentobarbital.

Reprieve, a legal action charity, uses the law to enforce the human rights of prisoners, from death row to Guantánamo Bay. Reprieve investigates, litigates and educates, working on the frontline, to provide legal support to prisoners unable to pay for it themselves. Reprieve promotes the rule of law around the world, securing each person’s right to a fair trial and saving lives. Clive Stafford Smith is the founder of Reprieve and has spent 27 years working on behalf of people facing the death penalty in the USA.

Reprieve

PO Box 52742

London EC4P 4WS

Tel: 020 7353 4640

Fax: 020 7353 4641

Email: info@reprieve.org.uk

Website: www.reprieve.org.uk

Source: Reprieve, May 16, 2011

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Europe fights the death penalty—with drugs

Danish company manufactures U.S. executioners' anesthetic of choice for lethal injections

BRUSSELS, Belgium — The Danish pharmaceutical company Lundbeck has an ethical dilemma.

It prides itself on making products that improve peoples’ lives. But one is helping put people to death.

Convicted killer Benny Joe Stevens was executed Tuesday in Mississippi’s Parchman State Penitentiary with a lethal injection of the anesthetic pentobarbital made by Lundbeck.

Denmark, like the rest of the European Union, is officially opposed to the death penalty. Lundbeck spokesman Anders Schroll said the company holds that position in the Danish headquarters as well as in its American office.

“This is a misuse of our product,” Schroll said. “We are in an ethical dilemma where we are opposed to the use of our medication for capital punishment while at the same time we want to make sure that patients who benefit from our medication get access to it.”

Pentobarbital also is used in the treatment of seizures in humans and in anesthesia and euthanasia of animals. Only Lundbeck still manufactures the drug for purchase in the United States. Schroll provided letters from doctors urging the company not to withdraw the 50 million doses of the drug sold each year.

For its part, Schroll said Lundbeck has sent letters to prisons in 11 states in recent months demanding they cease using pentobarbital as part of the lethal injection “cocktail” because “this is just not what we stand for” he said. The Danish foreign ministry has pursued the matter through its contacts. No prison has responded. In fact, more and more states are intending to use the drug, with Virginia, the secondmost-active death-penalty state, announcing a switch just this week, following the lead execution state, Texas, earlier this month.

A conundrum

The mid-sized Danish company is left in this “conundrum,” as Schroll put it, because other businesses have put an end to their products’ use in executions. Sodium thiopental was used as the requisite sedative in the lethal mix by all but one of the 36 death-penalty states until very recently. The only U.S. maker of sodium thiopental, Hospira, started running short in summer 2010 and stopped making it altogether in January when it moved its manufacturing facility to Italy, which forbade using it for executions.

The difficulty in obtaining sodium thiopental led to a mad scramble by institutions to obtain it, an effort that in some cases involved the Food and Drug Administration, which had to bypass certain regulations so it could be imported from Britain, where a company called Dream Pharma operated out of a driving school. The desperation of prison authorities and dodgy practices came to light in documents obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California and the London-based human rights group Reprieve.

The British government late last year put an emergency export ban on sodium thiopental, after being sued by Reprieve. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency has now seized stockpiles of sodium thiopental due to concerns raised about the legality of its import.

But there are also concerns about whether the drug made by Dream Pharma actually worked. The mother of executed Georgia inmate Brandon Rhode came to Europe recently to share the story of what she believes was the agonizing death of her son last year due to defective sodium thiopental. A lethal-injection expert said Brandon’s eyes remained open during his execution, indicating the sedative didn’t work properly. Patches Rohde pleaded with the British government to extend the emergency ban on the drug, saying U.S. authorities had “not only killed Brandon but tortured him … . I beg [you] to keep this torture from happening to anyone else.”

Last month Britain added pentobarbital along with two other lethal-injection drugs to the emergency export ban.

“We oppose the death penalty in all circumstances,” said U.K. Business Secretary Vince Cable, “and are clear that British drugs should not be used to carry out lethal injections.”

Patches Rohde is gratified. Speaking from her home in Mississippi this week, she said, “There’s just no words than can get across how it feels. The fact that Europeans are going to work harder to help people in prison in the U.S. than the people in the U.S. are is just”—she paused cautiously—“it’s shameful for the Americans … but it’s great. It really is.”

Source: TucsonSentinel.com, May 13, 2011

Related article: "Danish pharmaceutical company Lundbeck votes to continue supplying pentobarbital for lethal injections", Reprieve, March 25, 2011

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Lundbeck refuses to ask US court to prevent the use of its drugs in executions

Pharmaceutical company Lundbeck has refused to submit testimony to a US court opposing the use of its drugs in executions.

On behalf of capital defence lawyers in Alabama, legal action charity Reprieve had asked the company to submit an ‘amicus curiae’ brief to Alabama’s Supreme Court, voicing opposition to the use of Lundbeck-produced pentobarbital in the impending execution of Jason Williams and confirming that such use of the product was untested and not recommended.

However, Lundbeck has so far refused to take this simple action, even though it could help to stave off the increasing use of their products in US execution chambers – something to which they have claimed to be ‘adamantly opposed’ and to be doing 'all they can' to prevent.

Reprieve Investigator Maya Foa said:

“It is hard to see why Lundbeck would not take this straightforward opportunity which could help to save a life. With increasing numbers of US states using Lundbeck’s drugs to kill people, surely this is the very least they could do.

“There is still time for Lundbeck to change their mind and take this simple step. If they continue to refuse, their company ‘code of ethics’ will not be worth the paper it’s printed on.”

  

For further information please contact Donald Campbell in Reprieve’s press office on +44 (0)20 7427 1082 / (0)7791 755 415

1. Reprieve submitted a suggested draft of an amicus curiae (‘friend of the court’) brief to Lundbeck, which set out their opposition to the use of their drug Nembutal (another name for the barbiturate pentobarbital) in the execution of prisoners (a position Lundbeck has previously voiced publicly); voiced concerns over the use of the product for purposes for which it was not intended and potential safety implications; and stressed that such a use went against the company’s ethical position. However, Lundbeck claimed regulatory issues prevented them from doing so – it is unclear what these issues are. Copies of the suggested draft amicus curiae brief and relevant correspondence with Lundbeck are available on request.

2. Jason Williams is scheduled to be executed in Alabama on Thursday 19 May 2011, using a three-drug cocktail which includes Lundbeck's Nembutal (pentobarbital).  Williams' lawyers were only recently notified of Alabama's decision to switch from sodium thiopental to pentobarbital and the prison has released very limited information about their new lethal injection protocol. Veterinarians commonly use pentobarbital to put down animals, but they specifically rule out its use as part of a three drug cocktail in this manner due to safety concerns.

3. Increasing numbers of US states have started using pentobarbital in executions as domestic supplies of the (until recently) widely used anaesthetic sodium thiopental have dried up. Lundbeck is the sole supplier of pentobarbital in the US.

4. Seven prisoners have now been executed in the US using Lundbeck’s drugs, most recently Jeffrey Motts in South Carolina.

5. The increasing number of states using Lundbeck’s pentobarbital in executions includes those with the busiest (Texas) and second-busiest (Virginia) death chambers in the country. Virginia’s switch was reported earlier this week (9 May 2011). http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/virginia-to-use-new-drug-in-executions-amid-shortage-seizures-of-commonly-used-sedative/2011/05/09/AFq3STaG_story.html

Reprieve, a legal action charity, uses the law to enforce the human rights of prisoners, from death row to Guantánamo Bay. Reprieve investigates, litigates and educates, working on the frontline, to provide legal support to prisoners unable to pay for it themselves. Reprieve promotes the rule of law around the world, securing each person’s right to a fair trial and saving lives. Clive Stafford Smith is the founder of Reprieve and has spent 27 years working on behalf of people facing the death penalty in the USA.

Reprieve

PO Box 52742

London EC4P 4WS

Tel: 020 7353 4640

Fax: 020 7353 4641

Email: info@reprieve.org.uk

Website: www.reprieve.org.uk

Related article: "Danish pharmaceutical company Lundbeck votes to continue supplying pentobarbital for lethal injections", Reprieve, March 25, 2011

Contact Lundbeck,  send an email (contact@lundbeck.com)

Source: Reprieve, May 12, 2011

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Major investor dumps Lundbeck shares over death drug sales

A pension fund has sold millions of Euros’ worth of shares in pharmaceutical company Lundbeck as a result of concerns about the use of their drugs in US executions.

US states are increasingly turning to Lundbeck’s pentobarbital (Nembutal) to carry out executions by lethal injection, after domestic shortages hit supplies of another drug which was, until recently, widely used in American executions.

Lundbeck has claimed it is doing ‘everything it can’ to prevent this from taking place. However, Danish pension fund Unipension yesterday sold 40m Danish Krone (5.4m Euro) worth of shares, citing Lundbeck’s failure to ‘engage in a genuine dialogue’ about their efforts to ensure their products are not used ‘in an undesirable way’.

Meanwhile, Denmark’s largest pension scheme, ATP, have said that ‘there are still things that need clarification’ by Lundbeck concerning this issue.

Reprieve, a legal action charity, has asked Lundbeck to investigate a number of possible courses of action to prevent their drugs being used in this way. However, the firm has so far refused to either adopt these or to explain in any detail why they are not feasible.

Several investment consultants have recently been in touch with Reprieve to ask about the ethical investment issues concerning the use of Lundbeck’s drugs in executions.

Unipension’s action could raise serious questions for other institutional investors in Lundbeck around the world – such as Norway's Government Pension Fund Global, which at the end of 2010 held a stake in Lundbeck worth around $25 million.

Reprieve Investigator Maya Foa said:

“That Lundbeck has refused to adopt any of the strategies available to them to prevent the use of their drugs in executions is baffling. As more evidence comes out about how easy it would be for the company to restrict the distribution of the product, serious questions about the company’s integrity need to be asked.

“Lundbeck’s failure to provide adequate answers has frustrated politicians, doctors, journalists, human rights groups and now investors.

“The moral consequences of being complicit in executions should have been enough to make Lundbeck take action; perhaps now that they are being hit in the pocket, they’ll realise they simply cannot afford to ignore this issue for one day longer.” 

1. For further information, please contact Donald Campbell in Reprieve’s press office on +44 (0)20 7427 1082 / (0)7791 755 415

2. A factsheet on the distribution Lundbeck’s Nembutal and the potential courses of action available to the company to stop its use in lethal injections is available here:

http://www.reprieve.org.uk/static/downloads/2011_05_12_PUB_NEMBUTAL_DISTRIBUTION_BRIEFING.pdf

3. Unipension’s statement (in Danish) can be found here: http://www.unipension.dk/Unipension/Unipension/Nyheder.aspx?NewsItem=36d5ef2e-2eb0-4eea-bcb6-b5566c2aedf6 ]

4. ATP’s response to Unipension’s action (Danish) can be found here: http://m.business.dk/touch/article.pml?guid=14032973

5. For Norway’s Government fund investment in Lundbeck, see ‘Danes won’t block execution drug’, Jan M. Olsen and Karl Ritter, Associated Press, On Wednesday March 30, 2011 http://finance.yahoo.com/news/AP-Exclusive-Danes-wont-block-apf-2309525945.html?x=0&.v=3

“Among Lundbeck's institutional investors are Scandinavian pension funds, including oil-rich Norway's Government Pension Fund Global, which at the end of 2010 held a 0.68 percent stake in Lundbeck worth 150 million Norwegian kroner (about $25 million).”

Reprieve, a legal action charity, uses the law to enforce the human rights of prisoners, from death row to Guantánamo Bay. Reprieve investigates, litigates and educates, working on the frontline, to provide legal support to prisoners unable to pay for it themselves. Reprieve promotes the rule of law around the world, securing each person’s right to a fair trial and saving lives. Clive Stafford Smith is the founder of Reprieve and has spent 27 years working on behalf of people facing the death penalty in the USA.

Reprieve

PO Box 52742

London EC4P 4WS

Tel: 020 7353 4640

Fax: 020 7353 4641

Email: info@reprieve.org.uk

Website: www.reprieve.org.uk

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Mississippi executes Benny Joe Stevens

The state of Mississippi executed death row inmate Benny Joe Stevens (left), 52, at 6:22 p.m. today.

Stevens was convicted in 1999 of killing his ex-wife, Glenda Reid; her husband, Wesley Lee Reid; her 11-year-old son, Dylan Lee; and Lee's 10-year-old friend Heath Pounds.

He used his final moments to ask his victims' family members for forgiveness.

"What I've taken from God and you, I can't replace,'he said. I'm sorry."

Prior to his execution, Mississippi Department of Corrections Commissioner Chris Epps said Stevens expressed remorse over the crime, particularly the deaths of the 2 children.

"None of them deserved what I did,"Epps recalled.

The U.S. Supreme Court and Gov. Haley Barbour denied Stevens' last-ditch pleas for clemency.

Still, Epps said he remained talkative throughout the day. Stevens, who had no infractions during his time behind bars, showered and took a sedative - Valium - before being led to the execution room.

Stevens becomes the 1st condemned inmate to be put to death this year in Mississippi and the14th overall since the state resumed capital punishment in 1983.

Stevens becomes the 15th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in the USA and the 1249th overall since the nation resumed executions on January 17, 1977.

Sources: Clarion Ledger, Rick Halperin, May 11, 2011

Mississippi execution uses sedative for first time

WASHINGTON — Benny Joe Stevens, who was convicted of killing four people, including two children, has been executed by the state of Mississippi with a drug normally used to euthanize animals.

Stevens, 52, was pronounced dead at 6:22 pm (23:22 GMT) at the state penitentiary in the town of Parchman, according to Mississippi prison officials.

It was the first time the southern state had used the sedative pentobarbital instead of sodium thiopental, whose US manufacturer recently said it was no longer making the drug. Pentobarbital is also used in assisted suicides in two US states and as an animal euthanasia.

Mississippi is the latest US state to adopt pentobarbital as part of a three-drug protocol after Louisiana, Oklahoma, Texas and soon Alabama.

Pentobarbital, which produces an unconscious state, is followed by an injection of pancuronium bromide, which paralyzes the inmate, and finally potassium chloride, which stops the heart.

Ohio and the state of Washington use one single, massive dose of pentobarbital. The Danish company that makes the drug, Lundbeck Inc., has said it opposes the drug's use in executions.

The US Supreme Court denied a stay of execution, prison officials said.

Stevens appealed to the Mississippi Supreme Court over the change from sodium thiopental to pentobarbital, but his appeal was rejected last week.

Stevens was condemned to death for the 1999 murder of his ex-wife, Glenda Reid, Reid's husband, Wesley Reid, their 11-year-old son Dylan and the boy's friend Heath Pounds, in a mobile home park in rural Marion County following a custody dispute over Stevens' daughter.

The daughter, Erica, was wounded, and was a witness against Stevens in his trial.

Source: AFP, May 11, 2011
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Virginia to switch execution drugs amid shortage

Virginia will join other states that are switching the sedative used in lethal injections because of a nationwide shortage of the drug, officials said Monday

The Virginia Department of Corrections will substitute pentobarbital for sodium thiopental, whose sole U.S. manufacturer announced in January it would no longer make the drug.

The announcement sent the nation’s 34 death penalty states scrambling to find a new supplier. Some canceled executions, while others obtained the drug from England, but then had it confiscated by federal agents amid questions they circumvented the law to obtain it because that country has banned the drug’s export for executions.

It is not clear whether Virginia purchased sodium thiopental from overseas, and if so whether the Drug Enforcement Administration also seized its supply.

Department of Corrections spokesman Larry Traylor referred all questions to the Attorney General’s Office, which refused to answer questions about whether Virginia had obtained sodium thiopental from overseas.

Virginia will continue to use a three-drug cocktail, only substituting the sedative drugs, said Brian Gottstein, a spokesman for the Attorney General’s Office. The 1st drug sedates the inmate, while a 2nd stops his breathing and the 3rd stops the heart.

“The Virginia protocol for lethal injection has been litigated and has been found to be constitutionally acceptable by every court in Virginia that has looked at it ... and we are confident that the change to allow the drug pentobarbital to be substituted for sodium thiopental in the protocol will be found to be constitutionally acceptable, as well,” Gottstein said.

Pentobarbital has survived legal challenges in other states and has been used for recent executions in Oklahoma, Ohio and South Carolina.

Virginia is home to the nation’s 2nd-busiest death chamber, behind Texas. There currently are no scheduled executions.

Source: Associated Press, May 9, 2011

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3 executions at Parchman, Mississippi, set for May; more possible

The 1st execution this year is set for Tuesday, and on successive Tuesdays for the next 2 weeks 2 more inmates are scheduled to die by lethal injection.

And the 3 may not be the only death row inmates executed this year.

"There could be more this year, but no way to tell how many more," said Jan Schaefer, spokeswoman for the state attorney general's office. On Thursday, the Mississippi Supreme Court set Robert Simon Jr.'s execution for May 24.

The court had previously set a May 10 execution date for Benny Joe Stevens and a May 17 execution date for Rodney Gray.

In May last year, the state had its 1st back-to-back executions when Gerald Holland and Paul Woodward were put to death. Also, the state executed Joseph Daniel Burns in July.

The state Supreme Court set the stage for the 3rd execution this month when it ruled against Simon in a motion from his attorney alleging that Simon is incompetent for execution after he hit his head in prison.

Simon's attorney, T.H. Freeland IV of Oxford, had filed the motion April 1 in response to Attorney General Jim Hood's request for an April 20 execution date.

The court on Thursday said there was no sufficient evidence showing Simon has a mental condition.

Freeland couldn't be reached Friday. He didn't describe how Simon hit his head, but said in court papers Simon can't understand his case and has trouble carrying on conversations.

Freeland wanted the state Supreme Court to send the case back to a Quitman County judge for a hearing on Simon's competency.

Simon, 47, was sentenced to death for the killings of Carl Parker, his wife, Bobbie Jo, and their son, Gregory, on Feb. 2, 1990.

He was sentenced to life in prison for the killing of Charlotte Parker, the slain couple's 9-year-old daughter.

The killings occurred a few hours after the family had returned to their rural Quitman County home from church services.

Starting with Simon, the death row inmates will be executed with a new lethal injection cocktail.

Mississippi Department of Corrections Commissioner Chris Epps said MDOC will use the drug pentobarbital in its 3-drug lethal injection instead of sodium thiopental, the commonly used drug in prior executions across the country.

A nationwide shortage of sodium thiopental has prompted some states to look for an alternative.

Gray, Stevens and Simon through their civil attorney had challenged in court that MDOC failed to properly publicize the change in regulations to switch to a new drug as required by the Administrative Procedures Act.

Last month, Hinds County Circuit Judge Bill Gowan rejected the challenge. And Thursday, the state Supreme Court refused to consider an appeal of Gowan's ruling.

"I don't think at this moment there is anything else we can do," said Jackson lawyer David Neil McCarty, who represents the inmates on that issue.

"It's frustrating because we think we can win on this issue, but it will only happen after the executions," he said.

Stevens, now 52, was sentenced to death in 1999 for killing four people in Marion County's Foxworth community.

Killed were Glenda Lee Reid, 38, Stevens' former wife; Wesley Lee Reid, 38, her husband; Dylan Reid, her 11-year-old son; and Heath Pounds, 10, a neighbor's son who apparently was spending the night with Dylan.

Gray, now 38, was sentenced to death in 1996 for the 1994 rape and murder of Grace Blackwell of Louin, 79.

Blackwell was found shot multiple times in Newton County. She last had been seen withdrawing a large amount of money from her bank.

Source: Jackson Clarion Ledger, May 7, 2011

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Georgia plan would keep 3-drug executions

Georgia's top prison official is considering a plan that would allow the state to stick with a 3-drug combination for lethal injections by substituting a new drug for one seized by federal regulators in March, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press.

The proposal, which is being considered by Corrections Commissioner Brian Owens, would allow the state to use pentobarbital instead of sodium thiopental. The AP obtained the documents through an open records request. There is no timetable for a decision, said Georgia corrections spokeswoman Joan Heath.

State corrections officials have been working on the change since the Drug Enforcement Administration took Georgia's supply of sodium thiopental amid questions of whether the state circumvented the law to obtain the drug amid a nationwide shortage.

Earlier, state officials had visited Ohio, which uses only pentobarbital in lethal injections, and Oklahoma, which uses the sedative as part of a 3-drug combination, to study those procedures.

Most of the nation's 34 death penalty states have scrambled over the last year to find a new supplier of sodium thiopental since its sole manufacturer in the U.S. announced in January it will no longer make the drug. Several states postponed executions amid the shortage, and some have looked overseas to secure a supply.

Georgia's situation was made worse when the state had to surrender its stockpile of the drug after defense attorneys questioned whether the state properly registered with the DEA before importing the drug from London. Documents also show the drug was purchased from a London company that operates at the same address as a driving school.

State officials have said they don't have concerns about the quality of the sodium thiopental and that they are cooperating with investigators. Meanwhile, corrections officials have quietly begun laying the groundwork for a switch, collecting hundreds of pages of legal filings and other documents about the drugs, according to more than 1,000 pages of files reviewed by the AP.

The new procedure would require prison staffers to inject two syringes containing 2.5 grams of pentobarbital each into the death row inmate's bloodstream, followed by a syringe of saline to ensure a steady flow of the drug. After at least 5 minutes, staffers would then inject pancuronium bromide to paralyze the inmate and then potassium chloride to stop the heart.

The plan would also require officials to post a certificate from the DEA certifying the drugs were obtained legally at the medical room of the death chamber, which is housed in the Georgia State Prison in Jackson.

A switch would clear the way for Georgia to schedule the execution of Troy Anthony Davis, who was sentenced to die for the 1989 slaying of an off-duty Savannah police officer. The U.S. Supreme Court in March rejected his most recent legal appeal, but the state couldn't execute him because it didn't have the lethal injection drug.

The switch could also lead to legal challenges from defense attorneys and death penalty opponents. William Montross of the Atlanta-based Southern Center for Human Rights said he hoped Georgia corrections officials consulted with medical authorities in developing the policy.

"This new protocol was developed without public scrutiny and is highly experimental," he said.

Source: Associated Press, May 6, 2011

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South Carolina executes Jeffrey Motts

Jeffrey Motts

Jeffrey Motts was executed Friday. He died at 6:17 p.m.

South Carolina on Friday executed a man who strangled his cellmate, using a new combination of lethal injection drugs for the 2st time.

Jeffrey Motts, 36, was declared dead at 6:17 p.m. He was given the sedative pentobarbital instead of sodium thiopental as part of the lethal 3 drug combination because federal agents seized the state's supply as part of a nationwide investigation into whether prisons obtained the drugs legally from England.

Motts was sentenced to death for killing his cellmate at a state prison in Greenville County in 2005. He was already serving a life sentence for killing 2 elderly people during a Spartanburg County robbery in 1995.

Motts, strapped to a gurney in a green jumpsuit, never looked at the witnesses. It took him about 90 seconds to stop breathing after the lethal drugs began flowing through an IV. He took several heavy breaths, blinked and his head jerked slightly for about a minute before his breaths became shallow and eventually stopped.

His attorney read a last statement before he died: "To my mom and grandma, happy Mother's Day. I know this is a sad one but let us remember the good times. I am finally free and at peace in heaven."

He apologized to his victims' families, his own family and anyone he hurt along the way.

Motts abandoned all his appeals and volunteered for the death chamber

He confessed to strangling Charles "Chuck" Martin just hours after telling guards at Perry Correctional Institution in Greenville County where to find his body in a prison common area.

During that confession, he also asked investigators to tell prosecutors he was serving two life sentences and a third wasn't going to make a difference.

He told his attorneys he wanted to die, saying he only went to trial so his parents wouldn't think he was giving up. His push to enter the death chamber wavered briefly when his lawyers suggested he might be able to donate a kidney to his ailing sister, but he reaffirmed his wish to die after the 2 turned out not to be a match.

Motts and Martin had ended up in the same cell together in November 2005 despite asking to be kept apart because of a dispute over a stolen radio and a shank found in another inmate's cell.

Motts was already serving a life sentence for a 1995 double murder in Spartanburg County in the northwest part of the state. He tied up 79-year-old Clyde Camby and shot him at close range in the cheek at a home in Pacolet, then shot his 73-year-old great-aunt

Etta Osteen was shot in the back as she tried to get away, investigators said.

Camby was found with his pockets turned inside out. Authorities said Motts killed the pair to get money to buy crack.

He mentioned his drug addiction in his last statement.

"I want to warn kids of the dangers of drugs. I was the child everyone wanted their children around until I got on drugs. Drugs will destroy your life."

Executions have been carried out at the Broad River Correctional Institution since 1990.

Since 1997, however, death row has been at Lieber Correctional Institution near Ridgeville in the Lowcountry.

Once inmates are moved to the capital punishment facility they can no longer have visits with their families.

They are only allowed visits from their attorneys and spiritual advisors.

The last meal is served some time between 3:30 p.m. and 4 p.m. 

3 drugs are used for the lethal injection:

Pentobarbital puts the inmate to sleep

Pavulon stops breathing

Potassium Chloride stops the heart

The Department of Corrections separated death row from the capital punishment facility so the correctional officers who deal with death row inmates ever day for years are not the same ones who carry out the execution.

Motts becomes the 1st condemned inmate to be put to death this year in South Carolina and the 43rd overall since the state resumed capital punishment in 1985.

Motts becomes the 14th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in the USA and the 1248th overall since the nation resumed executions on January 17, 1977.

Sources: Associated Press, Rick Halperin, May 6, 2011

Related article: "Lundbeck drugs allow first South Carolina execution for 2 years", Reprieve, May 6, 2011

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Lundbeck drugs allow first South Carolina execution for 2 years

Drugs supplied by pharmaceutical company Lundbeck will today [Friday, May 6, 2011] allow the first execution in South Carolina in two years to go ahead.

Jeffrey Motts is set to be the first prisoner executed in the state using a new three-drug ‘cocktail’, adopted as a result of shortages in the US of a key anaesthetic previously used in the process.

A barbiturate, pentobarbital, will for the first time be used by South Carolina’s authorities as the initial step in the cocktail. This is an untested process which has raised concerns - not least as it is explicitly outlawed by vets for the euthanasia of animals.

Denmark-headquartered Lundbeck is increasingly becoming the major player in the American execution drugs market as it is the sole supplier of pentobarbital to the USA.

Death rows in the US have struggled to get hold of the previously-used drug, sodium thiopental, ever since domestic production ceased and action by Governments and companies around the world opposed to the death penalty cut off many lines of supply. South Carolina had obtained a stockpile of sodium thiopental from a British supplier operating out of the back of a driving school in Acton – however, this was seized towards the end of April by the US Drugs Enforcement Administration (DEA). As a result, they have now turned to Lundbeck’s pentobarbital.

Despite this, and the wider issue of the use of their products in executions, Lundbeck have refused to explain why they will not take action to prevent this from happening. Today’s execution is expected to bring the total number of people executed in the US using Lundbeck’s drugs to seven.

Reprieve Investigator Maya Foa said: “Lundbeck say they’re committed to improving life, yet this week alone their drugs have been used for two deaths. Something is indeed rotten in the state of Denmark.”

Source: Reprieve, May 6, 2011

Related article: "Danish pharmaceutical company Lundbeck votes to continue supplying pentobarbital for lethal injections", Reprieve, March 25, 2011

Contact Lundbeck,  send an email (contact@lundbeck.com)

Help spread this important message:

Lundbeck: YES! OUR DRUG KILLS

Already 6 human beings executed with Lundbeck's Pentobarbital. Demand Lundbeck Withdraw Execution Drug:http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/demand-lundbeck-withdraw-execution-drug/

Please sign and tell Danish company to stop helping the death penalty business in the USA! This petition is international and open to all! Please select your country, sign and share widely! 

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Texas executes Cary Kerr

Cary Kerr

HUNTSVILLE — Texas used a new three-drug combination to execute a condemned inmate for the first time Tuesday.

Cary Kerr, 46, of Dallas was pronounced dead at 6:19 p.m. Tuesday in the death house at the Huntsville Unit, nine minutes after the administration of a lethal dose of drug that included for the first time pentobarbital in place of sodium thiopental, which is no longer available. The state has used sodium thiopental since 1982.

Just before the lethal dose of drugs began to flow, Kerr proclaimed his innocence in the 2001 rape and murder of 34-year-old Pamela Horton in Haltom City near Fort Worth.

“To the state of Texas: I'm an innocent man,” Kerr said in his last statement. “Never trust a court-appointed attorney.”

Kerr then asked his friends to search for the person he claimed committed the crime.

“Check that DNA,” he said. “Check Scott.”

As the sedation drugs began to take effect, Kerr sighed deeply and said, “Here we go.”

“Lord Jesus,” he said. “Jesus.”

Earlier Tuesday, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to block Kerr’s execution. Kerr's appeal didn't challenge the drug switch. Rather, he argued that a lawyer didn't properly represent him in earlier appeals, according to the Associated Press.

Kerr told the AP he first met Horton when they lived in the same trailer park, then ran into her the evening of July 11, 2001, at a bar where he was celebrating passing the test to get his commercial truck driving license.

"I've never denied being with her," he said recently from death row.

Kerr said he was "half drunk" and Horton was drunk when he decided to take her to his place where they had sex and then argued. She left alive, he insisted.

Authorities said Kerr pushed Horton out of a moving vehicle after sexually assaulting her, which caused her death. A taxi driver discovered her body in the street at 2 a.m. the following morning.

Kerr requested a final meal of pizza, fried chicken, baked chicken, lasagna, tacos, pork ribs with picante sauce, cheeseburger, quiche with meat, cheese and broccoli and ice cream for dessert.

The next execution, of Gayland Bradford of Dallas County, is scheduled June 1.

Kerr, who lived most of his life in the Dallas area, previously served a year in jail after pleading guilty to a 1999 charge of assault with intent to do bodily harm.

Kerr becomes the 3rd condemned inmate to be put to death in Texas this year and the 467th overall since the state resumed capital punishment on December 7, 1982. At least 8 others have execution dates in the coming months, including 4 in June.

Kerr becomes the 228th condemned inmate to be put to death since rick Perry became governor of Texas in 2001.

Kerr becomes the 13th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in the USA and the 1247th overall since the nation resumed executions on January 17, 1977.

Source: The Huntsville Item, Rick Halperin, May 3, 2011

Texas executes first inmate using drug used on animals

(Reuters) - Texas on Tuesday carried out its first execution using a sedative often used to euthanize animals.

Cary Kerr, 46, was put to death by lethal injection for the 2001 sexual assault and strangling of Pamela Horton.

The new drug, pentobarbital, replaced sodium thiopental in Texas' three-drug execution protocol.

The change was necessary because Hospira Inc. of Illinois announced in January it would stop making the sodium thiopental after Italy objected to Hospira manufacturing an execution drug in that country. That caused a shortage of the drug throughout the United States.

Ohio and Oklahoma have already switched to use of pentobarbital in executions.

Another Texas inmate, Cleve Foster, had been scheduled to be the first person in the state executed using the new drug last month. But Foster received a temporary stay of execution from the U.S. Supreme Court over concerns his state-appointed lawyers were ineffective.

Kerr was pronounced dead at 6:19 p.m. on Tuesday, said Michelle Lyons, a spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

"To the state of Texas: I am an innocent man," were among Kerr's final words, according to Lyons. "Never trust a court-appointed attorney. I am ready, warden."

Kerr was the third prisoner to be put to death this year in Texas, which executes more prisoners than any other state.

Texas executed 17 people in 2010, down from 24 in 2009.

Source: Reuters, May 3, 2011

Help spread this important message:

Lundbeck: YES! OUR DRUG KILLS

Already 6 human beings executed with Lundbeck's Pentobarbital. Demand Lundbeck Withdraw Execution Drug: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/demand-lundbeck-withdraw-execution-drug/

Please sign and tell Danish company to stop helping the death penalty business in the USA! This petition is international and open to all! Please select your country, sign and share widely!
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