The U.S. Constitution does not guarantee a prisoner sentenced to capital punishm...
WASHINGTON - The U.S. Constitution does not guarantee a prisoner sentenced to capital punishment “a painless death,” a divided Supreme Court said on Monday, paving the way for the execution of a convicted murderer who sought to die by lethal gas rather than lethal injection because of a rare medical condition.
In a decision that exposed stark divisions among the justices on the death penalty, the court ruled 5-4 that Bucklew had failed to present enough evidence to pursue his request to be executed by lethal gas. The court’s five conservatives were in the majority and its four liberals dissented. Bucklew failed to show that lethal gas could be “readily implemented” as required under Supreme Court precedent, the court ruled. There also was no evidence that his chosen alternative, lethal gas, would be less painful, it concluded.
Fellow conservative Justice Samuel Alito said in 2015 that the legal challenge to Oklahoma’s method of execution case was part of a “guerilla war” against the death penalty. When death row inmates seek last-minute stays of execution, courts should individual cases on their merits, Sotomayor said. In Missouri, execution is authorized using either injection or gas but the state in practice uses only lethal injection.
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