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Page Number: 16.0

12 

GLOSSIP v. GROSS 

Opinion of the Court 

The  Eighth  Amendment,  made  applicable  to  the  States
through  the  Fourteenth  Amendment,  prohibits  the  inflic-
tion of “cruel and unusual punishments.”  The controlling 
opinion in Baze outlined what a prisoner must establish to 
succeed  on  an  Eighth  Amendment  method-of-execution
claim.  Baze  involved  a  challenge  by  Kentucky  death  row 
inmates to that State’s three-drug lethal injection protocol 
of sodium thiopental, pancuronium bromide, and potassium
chloride.  The  inmates  conceded  that  the  protocol,  if 
properly  administered,  would  result  in  a  humane  and 
constitutional execution because sodium thiopental would
render  an  inmate  oblivious  to  any  pain  caused  by  the 
second and third drugs.  553 U. S., at 49.  But they argued
that there was an unacceptable risk that sodium thiopen-
tal  would  not  be  properly  administered.  Ibid.    The  in-
mates  also  maintained  that  a  significant  risk  of  harm
could be eliminated if Kentucky adopted a one-drug proto-
col and additional monitoring by trained personnel.  Id., at 
51. 

The  controlling  opinion  in  Baze  first  concluded  that 
prisoners cannot successfully challenge a method of execu-
tion unless they establish that the method presents a risk
that  is  “ ‘sure  or  very  likely  to  cause  serious  illness  and 
needless suffering,’ and give rise to ‘sufficiently imminent 
dangers.’ ”    Id.,  at  50  (quoting  Helling  v.  McKinney,  509 
U. S.  25,  33,  34–35  (1993)).    To  prevail  on  such  a  claim, 
“there  must  be  a  ‘substantial  risk  of  serious  harm,’  an 
‘objectively  intolerable  risk  of  harm’  that  prevents  prison
officials from pleading that they were ‘subjectively blame-
less  for  purposes  of  the  Eighth  Amendment.’ ”    553  U. S., 
at 50 (quoting Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U. S. 825, 846, and 
n. 9  (1994)).  The  controlling  opinion  also  stated  that 
prisoners  “cannot  successfully  challenge  a  State’s  method 
of  execution  merely  by  showing  a  slightly  or  marginally 
safer  alternative.”  553  U. S.,  at  51.    Instead,  prisoners 
must  identify  an  alternative  that  is  “feasible,  readily