Facing the same pentobarbitol shortage as other states, Alabama needed a new way to execute people by lethal injection. According to Bryan Liman at the Montgomery Advertiser, the state Department of Corrections has now chosen to borrow Florida’s death cocktail recipe.
Under the new protocol, the condemned would first be administered 500 milligrams of midazolam hydrochloride, a sedative; 600 milligrams of rocuronium bromide, a paralyzing drug and, finally, 240 “milliequivalents” of potassium chloride, to stop the heart.
[…] Florida has executed seven men under the protocol this year, with no reported complications. However, midazolam hydrochloride, often used as an anesthetic, has been present during botched executions in other parts of the country, though its role in the complications that arose is not clear.
[…] “The common denominator in all three (botched executions) this year was midazolam,” said Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, which opposes capital punishment. “They didn’t all use the same second and third drugs.”
Such a proud day in the Heart of Dixie.
