Texas obtains new supply of execution drugs from source kept secret

[Redfairen]

Source: Associated Press

Texas has obtained a new batch of the drugs it uses to execute death row inmates, allowing the state to continue carrying out death sentences once its existing supply expires at the end of the month.

But correction officials will not say where they bought the drugs, arguing that information must be kept secret to protect the safety of its new supplier. In interviews with the Associated Press, officials with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice also refused to say whether providing anonymity to its new supplier of the sedative pentobarbital was a condition of its purchase.

The decision to keep details about the drugs and their source secret puts the agency at odds with past rulings of the state attorney general’s office, which has said the state’s open records law requires the agency to disclose specifics about the drugs it uses to carry out lethal injections.

"We are not disclosing the identity of the pharmacy because of previous, specific threats of serious physical harm made against businesses and their employees that have provided drugs used in the lethal injection process,” said Texas Department of Criminal Justice spokesman Jason Clark.

Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/19/texas-execution-drugs-death-row-secrecy

[hobbit709]

1. so they're buying stuff on the black market now?

[Deep13]

2. oh good, I was afraid they might have to stop killing people.

[olddad56]

5. the would stone them to death before they would stop killing inmates.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

3. well, at least they aren't just raiding the prison pharmacy and wondering

and trying to guess how much of the green stuff it will take to kill somebody.

[yuiyoshida]

4. Can I guess?

Its a country that starts with the LETTER R.... and ends with the letter A... six letters!

[cstanleytech]

6. Rwanda? nt

[AtheistCrusader]

7. I was going to guess Russia.

[jmowreader]

8. Rwanda?

No, no, nothing so elaborate as importing drugs from other countries. They're getting their lethal injection drugs from compounding pharmacies in the US. Other states do it; why should Texas be any different?

They just think if anyone knows which pharmacy is making the stuff, "anti-death-penalty activists" (or, more likely, hardcore teabaggers who want to discredit people who are against capital punishment) might go over and throw an empty oil drum through the pharmacy's window.

[Feral Child]

10. Damn!

I was going to mention the governor's cousin, TomTom, and his double-wide lab, but you pre-empted me.

[SkatmanRoth]

11. Ebay?

[BadgerKid]

12. Think Missouri was doing similar. n/t