Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-alsd-1_07-cv-00722/USCOURTS-alsd-1_07-cv-00722-1/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 555
Nature of Suit: Prisoner - Prison Condition
Cause of Action: 42:1983 Prisoner Civil Rights

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1

Under the expedited schedule adopted by the Court on the plaintiff’s motion, the

defendant’s reply brief was filed on Friday, November 9, 2007. The next business day

was November 13.

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF ALABAMA

SOUTHERN DIVISION

THOMAS D. ARTHUR, )

 )

Plaintiff, )

 )

v. ) CIVIL ACTION 07-0722-WS-M

 )

RICHARD ALLEN, etc., et al., )

 )

Defendants. )

ORDER

This matter is before the Court on the defendants’ motion to dismiss. (Doc. 19). 

The plaintiff has filed a response and the defendants a reply, (Docs. 20, 21), and the

motion became ripe for resolution on November 13, 2007.1

 After carefully considering

the foregoing and other relevant material in the file, the Court concludes that the motion

to dismiss is due to be granted.

This case represents the second iteration of the plaintiff’s challenge to Alabama’s

lethal injection protocol. In May 2007, the plaintiff filed a lawsuit seeking to enjoin the

defendants “from using the State of Alabama’s current lethal injection procedures to

execute him.” (Arthur v. Allen, Civ. No. 07-0342-WS-C (“Arthur I”), Doc. 1 at 1-2). 

Under those procedures, the state employs a three-drug sequence in inducing death: (1) a

short-acting anesthetic (sodium pentothal); (2) a drug inducing muscle paralysis

(pancuronium bromide); and (3) a final, lethal drug (potassium chloride). The complaint

alleged that potassium chloride is capable of causing excruciating pain to an inadequately

anesthetized person and that the paralysis induced by pancuronium bromide would

prevent an insufficiently anesthetized person from alerting the outside world to his

distress through muscle movement. The complaint alleged that the drugs utilized, the

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2

Arthur v. Allen, 2007 WL 2320069 at *5 (S.D. Ala. 2007).

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standards for their administration, and inadequate qualifications for personnel involved in

the process, “create a grave and substantial risk that [the plaintiff] will be conscious

throughout the execution process and, as a result, will experience an excruciatingly

painful and protracted death.” (Id. at 9, ¶ 31; accord id. at 10, ¶ 34). 

On August 10, 2007, the Court granted the defendants’ motion to dismiss, based

on the specialized “‘equitable principles at issue when inmates facing imminent execution

delay in raising their § 1983 method-of-execution challenges.’” (Arthur I, Doc. 19 at 8-9

(quoting Grayson v. Allen, 491 F.3d 1318, 1322 (11th Cir. 2007)).2

 On September 17,

2007, the Eleventh Circuit affirmed, leaving intact the plaintiff’s September 27, 2007

execution date. Arthur v. Allen, 2007 WL 2709942 (11th Cir. 2007) (“Arthur II”). On

September 21, 2007, the plaintiff filed with the Supreme Court a petition for writ of

certiorari and motion to stay. (Doc. 1 at 3, ¶ 9). The petition and motion remain pending. 

(Doc. 20 at 29).

On September 25, 2007, the Supreme Court granted a petition for writ of certiorari

in Baze v. Rees, 2007 WL 2075334 (2007), to consider the constitutionality of the threedrug regimen employed by both Kentucky and Alabama. On September 26, 2007, the

State of Alabama, through Governor Riley, announced that changes would be made to its

lethal injection protocol. On September 27, 2007, Governor Riley granted the plaintiff a

45-day stay of execution, to allow the state time to modify its protocol. (Doc. 1, Exhibit

A). On September 28, 2007, the State moved the Alabama Supreme Court to set an

execution date. (Id. at 6, ¶ 16). On October 31, 2007, the Supreme Court set an

execution date of December 6, 2007. (Doc. 19, Exhibit I).

Meanwhile, the plaintiff filed this lawsuit on October 9, 2007, seeking an

injunction “to prohibit the Defendants from using the lethal injection procedures as

recently modified by the State of Alabama to execute him.” (Doc. 1 at 1). Using the

identical language employed in his first lawsuit, the complaint alleges that the

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The plaintiff purports to question whether the state made these changes, (Doc. 20

at 13 n.2), but his complaint alleges the first, and his brief concedes both. (Doc. 1 at 14, ¶

53; Doc. 20 at 9, 17, 23). At any rate, the plaintiff’s insistence that material beyond the

complaint not be considered, (id. at 13 n.2), would simply shrink the scope of the

modifications without aiding his case.

4

This is not surprising, since it would be difficult to conceive how adding the

safeguards of physical confirmation of unconsciousness (even by an unqualified

individual) and additional anesthetic could affirmatively increase the chances of inflicting

unconstitutional pain. 

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constitutional violation arises from the risk that the plaintiff will be conscious during his

execution and thus experience excruciating pain from the potassium chloride. (Doc. 1 at

12, ¶ 45; id. at 16, ¶ 65). 

The modifications to the protocol consist of the following additions to the preexisting procedures: (1) examination of the prisoner by an execution team member,

following administration of the sodium pentothal but before administration of the

pancuronium bromide, to assess his consciousness (by calling his name, gently stroking

his eyelashes, and pinching his arm); and (2) administration of a second dosage of sodium

pentothal if the preceding examination reveals consciousness. (Doc. 19, Exhibit H, ¶ 2).3

The plaintiff does not allege that the modifications to the protocol cause or

exacerbate an Eighth Amendment violation. Rather, he alleges only that they “do not

mitigate” the allegedly unconstitutional risk already posed by the protocol in effect at the

time of his previous lawsuit. (Doc. 1 at 16, ¶ 63; accord id. at 15, ¶ 56; id. at 2 (execution

is cruel and unusual “in spite of any modifications” to the protocol). The modifications,

in short, do not provide the basis, or even part of the basis, for the plaintiff’s

constitutional challenge.4

 

Instead, the plaintiff employs the modifications for the proposition that they, when

added to the pre-existing protocol, create a different protocol — one which he may

challenge without the timeliness objections that doomed his previous lawsuit. The

difficulty is that this “new” protocol is identical to the “old” protocol in every particular

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This is true whether the modifications are considered “substantial,” as argued by

the plaintiff, or “minor,” as insisted by the defendants.

6

Arthur II, 2007 WL 2709942 at *4 (“As the district court noted, four months is

not enough time for this case to be fully adjudicated.”).

7

Because the case is due to be dismissed under these specialized equitable

principles, the Court need not address the defendants’ alternative arguments that dismissal

is required based on lack of jurisdiction, res judicata, law of the case, laches, and/or

statute of limitations.

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as to which the plaintiff finds constitutional objection. No new wrong has been

perpetrated, no new or heightened danger introduced.5

 The plaintiff is therefore in

precisely the same situation as he was in August, and his current lawsuit must be

dismissed on precisely the same grounds as was its predecessor. 

In particular, the petitioner has not overcome the strong presumption against the

grant of injunctive relief that arose because he unreasonably delayed in bringing this

action and because he could have brought his claim in time to allow consideration of its

merits without requiring a stay of execution. See Arthur I, 2007 WL 2320069 at *2-4. 

The merits of the plaintiff’s claim, including appeal, cannot be litigated in three weeks,6

and the possibility that the Supreme Court will grant the plaintiff’s pending motion to stay

does not, as he suggests, license the Court to ignore the December 6 execution date now

in place.7

For the reasons set forth above, the defendants’ motion to dismiss is granted. 

Judgment shall be entered accordingly by separate order.

DONE and ORDERED this 15th day of November, 2007.

s/ WILLIAM H. STEELE

UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

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