Opinion ID: 1697471
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Technical Errors

Text: Schwab lists three areas of concern which, he contends, require the Court to take a closer look at the Florida protocol, alleging it fails to meet the standard of Baze. He first addresses technical errors that have allegedly occurred in actual past executions, such as irregular IV placements and multiple needle punctures indicating failure to gain IV access at the initial site. These alleged errors are not newly discovered evidence but could have been and were the subject of prior motions. Additionally, Schwab fails to explain how these anomalies relate to a Eighth Amendment claim. As the Court noted in Lightbourne, and as anyone who has spent time in a hospital knows, problems inserting IV lines are common even under the best of medical circumstances. Id. at 348. Being pricked numerous times in the course of having an IV inserted is not cruel and unusual punishment, however uncomfortable it may be. Schwab claims that a critical distinction exists between the approved Kentucky procedures and the Florida protocol when it comes to training for IV insertions and that errors in the recent mock executions demonstrate DOC's inability to perform an execution without creating a risk of harm. Schwab has not provided the Court with a copy of the Kentucky protocol, leaving the Court to assess that protocol as described in Baze. Kentucky procedure requires that the execution team participate in at least ten mock executions a year and those practices include the actual insertion of IV lines into volunteers. Florida, on the other hand, apparently does not actually insert IV lines during training Lightbourne at 349. However, the Florida personnel inserting IVs during execution must be phlebotmotists certified by a national certification agency or emergency medical technicians or paramedics certified under Chapter 401, Florida Statutes. (Exhibit A, Defendant's Exhibit 2, Florida Lethal Injection Protocol, p. 2). Additionally, Warden Cannon testified in the Lightbourne hearings that these certified persons must also be currently employed in their area of medical expertise and must perform their assigned functions in their daily duties Lightbourne at 349. These certified professionals are the very same type of certified professionals we assume have sufficient training to save our lives in a medical setting and the same type of professionals required in Kentucky. Baze at 1528. The Court does not find that the failure to utilize actual IV insertions during mock executions has a significant impact in creating a risk of harm. The persons chosen to insert IV lines must have appropriate certification and, according to Warden Cannon, significant on-going experience in IV technology as part of their daily duties. Obtaining volunteers for practice IV insertions is not an enforceable criteria, as it would depend on the existence of living volunteers willing to subject themselves to the procedure, something which cannot be guaranteed. While the Florida protocol calls for training sessions to be held quarterly at a minimum, Warden Cannon testified that monthly training sessions are held and that team members practice their responses to problems that might arise. Lightbourne at 349. The protocol dictates that a practice execution will be conducted one week prior to the scheduled date of an execution and that all persons involved in the actual execution are to participate in this practice. This level of scheduled practices is substantially similar to the ten sessions conducted annually by Kentucky. The critical point at which the Eighth Amendment comes into play in the course of a lethal injection is the point at which the second drug is administered. [P]roper administration of the first drug, sodium thiopental, eliminates any meaningful risk that a prisoner would experience pain from the subsequent injections of pancuronium and potassium chloride. Baze at 1530. See also Lightbourne at 351. if the sodium pentathol is properly injected, it is undisputed that the inmate will not feel pain from the effects of the subsequent chemicals. Thus, the critical Eighth Amendment concern is whether the prisoner has, in fact, been rendered unconscious by the first drug, not whether there are `irregular IV placements,' surgical incisions, multiple needle punctures or even subcutaneous IV insertion, errors alleged by Schwab to have occurred in actual executions As to training exercises, where IVs are not actually inserted, the Court questions what criteria Schwab uses when he describes a training exercise as a failed one. The Court will address assessment of consciousness further below It rejects the argument that the alleged error rate in the insertion of IVs, by itself, creates a substantial risk of serious harm, as did the United States Supreme Court when it concluded that asserted problems relating to the IV lines do not establish a sufficiently substantial risk of harm to meet the requirements of the Eighth Amendment. Baze at 1533. Florida protocol with regard to the training and expertise of IV technicians is substantially similar to Kentucky procedures and does not create an objectively intolerable risk of harm. Florida protocol provides an extra safeguard apparently not in the Kentucky procedure as it requires that, one week prior to the execution, an assessment is made of the defendant to determine appropriate IV access (Exhibit A, p. 5).