Opinion ID: 4181681
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Substantial risk of severe pain

Text: Under Glossip, to establish that a method of execution violates the Eighth Amendment, prisoners must first “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.’ To prevail on such a claim, ‘there must be a substantial risk of serious harm[.]’” Glossip, 135 S. Ct. at 2737 (quoting Baze v. Rees, 553 U.S. 35, 50 (2008) (plurality opinion)) (emphasis in original). No. 17-3076 In re Ohio Execution Protocol Litig. Page 23 The majority is certainly correct that plaintiffs must meet a “heavy burden” to make the “rigorous showing” that a method of execution creates a substantial risk of serious harm. Maj. Op. at 6 (quoting Baze, 553 U.S. at 53). The majority and I disagree about whether the determination that a method of execution creates a substantial risk of serious harm is a factual finding reviewed for clear error or a legal conclusion reviewed less deferentially. The majority characterizes the determination as application of a “legal standard” and reviews it without deference. Maj. Op. at 5. My view that this determination is a factual finding that must be reviewed for clear error comes directly from the language of the Supreme Court. In Glossip, the Supreme Court said that the Oklahoma district court “did not commit clear error when it found that the prisoners failed to establish that Oklahoma’s use of a massive dose of midazolam in its execution protocol entails a substantial risk of severe pain.” Glossip, 135 S. Ct. at 2731. This statement is explicit that a district court’s determination as to whether midazolam entails a substantial risk of severe pain must be reviewed for clear error. In this case, the magistrate judge—relying on his “superior[] . . . position to make determinations of credibility” and “experience” in “the determination of fact”—evaluated evidence from scientific experts, eyewitnesses to executions, and ODRC employees discussing Ohio’s current execution protocol. Anderson, 470 U.S. at 574. Based on this evidence, the district court found that Plaintiffs were likely to succeed on their claim that the use of midazolam as the first drug in a three-drug protocol creates a substantial risk of severe pain. Decision & Order at 104–05. The district court found “from both the expert opinions and the lay descriptions comparing executions with a barbiturate as the first drug and midazolam as the first drug that the drugs do not produce the same effects in those being executed . . . . [T]hose administered midazolam . . . take longer to die and exhibit different bodily behaviors in the process.” Id. at 104. Evaluating the evidence presented to it during the hearing, including the eyewitness testimony and the opposing viewpoints presented by the experts, the district court “conclude[d] that use of midazolam as the first drug in Ohio’s present three-drug protocol will create ‘a substantial risk of serious harm.’” Id. at 105. For several reasons, the district court’s determination was not clearly erroneous. First of all, the district court did not base its opinion on uncertainty, as the majority asserts. Plaintiffs’ No. 17-3076 In re Ohio Execution Protocol Litig. Page 24 experts testified unequivocally that Ohio’s midazolam three-drug protocol is highly likely to cause intolerable pain. Id. at 40, 43, 47, 55. The district court was in the position to make credibility determinations about the competing experts’ testimony, and the district court’s discussion of the experts’ testimony indicates that it found Plaintiffs’ experts to be more credible than Defendants’. See Decision & Order at 103–05. For example, the district court recognized that Defendants’ experts did not agree with each other about whether midazolam has a ceiling effect, and Dr. Buffington did not appear to agree with Dr. Antognini that midazolam has analgesic properties (only that it would sedate someone sufficiently to make them insensate to pain, which is distinct from actually eliminating pain). Id. at 71–75, 93–94. By contrast, Plaintiffs’ experts were in agreement that midazolam does not have analgesic properties, and, although he was less adamant, Dr. Bergese generally agreed with Dr. Stevens that midazolam has a ceiling effect. Id. 31, 87. The specific points of disagreement between Defendants’ experts support the district court’s determination that Plaintiffs’ experts were more convincing. It is also noteworthy that the district court in this case evaluated evidence that was not available to the Oklahoma district court in Glossip. The district court heard testimony from eyewitnesses to five executions. Two of those, the execution of Christopher Brooks and the execution of Ronald Smith, occurred after the Glossip decision. In addition to providing the district court with information about additional midazolam-involved executions, these recent executions also shed new light on earlier midazolam-involved executions. In Glossip, the Supreme Court noted that neither Lockett nor Wood received the dose of midazolam at issue in the case before it, and that there were problems with the Lockett execution that were not attributable to the drugs used (namely, “the execution team’s inability to obtain an IV access site”). Glossip, 135 S. Ct. at 2746. Taking into account these differences, the Supreme Court said that “[w]hen all of the circumstances are considered, the Lockett and Wood executions have little probative value for present purposes.” Id. This conclusion may have been reasonable given the circumstances at the time, but new circumstances entitle a district court to come to a different conclusion. The Brooks execution, and particularly the Smith execution, in which Smith coughed, flailed, and heaved for several minutes, cast the problems observed in the No. 17-3076 In re Ohio Execution Protocol Litig. Page 25 Lockett and Wood executions in a new light. Unlike Lockett and Wood, both Smith and Brooks were executed using 500 milligrams of midazolam followed by a paralytic drug and potassium chloride (like Ohio’s current protocol). Like Lockett and Wood, witnesses testified that Smith and Brooks moved and heaved during their executions. Witnesses’ testimony that Brooks was heaving and that Smith was heaving, coughing, and flailing could suggest that Lockett’s writhing and Wood’s gasping were attributable to midazolam’s inability to prevent the pain caused by paralytic drugs and potassium chloride, rather than to other circumstances. The district court made the specific finding that these eyewitnesses were credible, even though many “were from legal practices devoted to representing capital clients.” Id. at 24. The district court noted that “their testimony was carefully confined to observations rather than opinions,” in “contrast[] with some press characterizations of some of these executions as ‘botched,’ ‘horrendous,’ ‘barbaric,’ and so forth. These witnesses were carefully professional in not adding advocatory characterizations to their observations.” Id. at 24–25. The majority argues that the district court did not offer enough reasoning in support of its decision. Maj. Op. at 6. I agree that ideally the district court would have offered more reasoning in support of its findings. But it is clear that the district court’s specific findings were meant to be read in conjunction with its lengthy discussion of the testimony. And I do not agree that the district court’s 119-page opinion, which included a discussion of the testimony and specific findings of fact, did not provide sufficient reasoning to be entitled to the deference that we must give to district courts’ findings of fact. (The majority recognizes that the district court produced its opinion under tight timelines, but fails to acknowledge that these timelines were imposed by the State of Ohio.) In my view, the district court’s finding that “use of midazolam as the first drug in Ohio’s present three-drug protocol will create ‘a substantial risk of serious harm,’” Decision & Order at 105, was not clearly erroneous, and we are bound by this finding.