Georgia Uses Secrecy Law to Obtain Lethal Drug for Execution of Mentally Disabled Prisoner

The state of Georgia has used a new secrecy law to hide the identity of the company that would supply the lethal injection to a mentally disabled inmate who is fighting his planned execution.

The execution of Warren Hill, 52, was blocked for the time being by Superior Court Judge Gail Tusan after Hill’s attorney claimed in a court filing that his client’s rights were violated by the Lethal Injection Secrecy Law, which makes the identity of the suppliers of the sedative pentobarbital a “state secret” to thwart protesters from boycotting such businesses.

Hill’s attorney argues that blocking the name of the drug supplier leaves his client “with no means for determining whether the drugs for his lethal injection are safe and will reliably perform their function, or if they are tainted, counterfeited, expired or compromised in some other way.”

The Georgia state courts will now reconsider Hill’s case on Thursday, which could wind up before the U.S. Supreme Court if the execution is put back on schedule.

The nation’s highest court ruled in 2002 that the judicial killing of “mentally retarded” people was unconstitutional.

Nine medical experts have examined Hill over the years and all of them concluded he is intellectually disabled. Three of those experts reversed their original opinion of 2000—that Hill was faking retardation—which had been a key contributing factor to sentencing Hill to death. They now claim that they had been rushed in providing their opinions, and that medical understanding of mental disabilities has since evolved.

http://www.allgov.com/news/controversies/georgia-uses-secrecy-law-to-obtain-lethal-drug-for-execution-of-mentally-disabled-prisoner-130717?news=850586&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter