High Court Upholds Kentucky

[WSJ_law_blog]

The Supreme Court Wednesday morning issued a splintered ruling upholding lethal-injection methods used by Kentucky. The outcome will allow an unofficial nationwide moratorium on death-penalty executions to end. Here are early stories from the WSJ, the AP, and Scotusblog. Click here for the opinion.

The court failed to reach a clear majority on legal reasoning for affirming Kentucky’s procedures. But seven justices — filing six separate opinions — ultimately decided the procedures Kentucky uses don’t amount to cruel and unusual punishment. Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and David Souter dissented. The main opinion, authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, was supported by three members of the court.

The Court was deciding whether the lethal-injection procedures facing two Kentucky inmates who say the state’s lethal-injection procedures would be put at an unconstitutional level of risk for pain when they are put to death. At issue was whether a commonly used three-drug lethal-injection protocol, if administered poorly, can cause excruciating pain and whether an alternative method such as administering only one drug carries less pain risk.

Numerous states have undertaken review of lethal-injection procedures, and inmates across the country have been fighting the practice in court cases. No one has been put to death in the U.S. since September, when the Supreme Court agreed to hear this appeal.