Anesthesiology Expert & Death Penalty Procedures Overhaul

Ohio prison officials are considering a major overhaul of death-penalty procedures that might include changing out such key elements as drugs and an execution team. Prison officials are consulting with Dr. Mark Dershwitz, a University of Massachusetts professor of anesthesiology who testified for the state last year as a paid anesthesiology expert witness in a lethal-injection lawsuit in federal court. He has consulted with several states on lethal-injection litigation.

Ohio would become the first state to make major changes in a three-drug execution process that was essentially copied by 35 states from Oklahoma, where it was developed by an anesthesiologist in 1977.  Injecting deadly drugs into muscle and bone, using a single, more powerful drug, or using an entirely different combination of drugs are options being reviewed. Gov. Ted Strickland and prisons director Terry Collins are considering major changes after the botched Sept. 15 execution of Romell Broom of Cleveland, the first time in modern U.S. history that an execution had to be abandoned after it was started.

Richard Dieter, executive director of the Washington-based Death Penalty Information Center, said it is "significant that they're looking at a major overhaul of the process. This has been a long time coming." California and Maryland are looking at protocol and procedures changes, but Dieter said no other state is considering the major revamp contemplated by Ohio officials.

Excerpted from dispatchpolitics.com.