Court Opinion

ID: 9410408
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-07-21 06:00:47.323862+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:20:57.525940
License: Public Domain

Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023)            1

                   SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
                          _________________

                      No. 23–5145 (23A51)
                          _________________

 JAMES EDWARD BARBER v. KAY IVEY, GOVERNOR
            OF ALABAMA, ET AL.
ON APPLICATION FOR STAY AND ON PETITION FOR A WRIT OF
 CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
             FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
                         [July 21, 2023]

   The application for stay of execution of sentence of death
presented to JUSTICE THOMAS and by him referred to the
Court is denied. The petition for a writ of certiorari is de-
nied.
   JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR, with whom JUSTICE KAGAN and
JUSTICE JACKSON join, dissenting from the denial of appli-
cation for stay.
   Just last year in Alabama, in three consecutive execu-
tions by lethal injection, prison officials spent multiple
hours digging for prisoners’ veins in an attempt to set IV
lines. Two of the men survived and reported experiencing
extreme pain, including, in one case, nerve pain equivalent
to electrocution. After those executions failed, the State be-
gan what it claimed would be a “top-to-bottom” review of its
lethal injection process. Barber v. Governor of Ala., ___ F.
4th ___, ___, 2023 WL 4622945, *13 (CA11, July 19, 2023)
(Pryor, J., dissenting). During this review, conducted by
the very agency that botched the executions, the State of-
fered no explanations for the failures and reported “[n]o de-
ficiencies” in its protocols. Id., at *15.
   Now, the State seeks to execute James Edward Barber.
Barber has timely raised an Eighth Amendment method of
execution claim in federal court, arguing that he will be
2                      BARBER v. IVEY

                   SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

subject to the same fate as last year’s prisoners. Yet Ala-
bama plans to kill him by lethal injection in a matter of
hours, without ever allowing him discovery into what went
wrong in the three prior executions and whether the State
has fixed those problems. The Eighth Amendment de-
mands more than the State’s word that this time will be
different. The Court should not allow Alabama to test the
efficacy of its internal review by using Barber as its “guinea
pig.” Id., at *11. It should grant Barber’s application for a
stay of his execution.
                                 I
   Governor Kay Ivey paused executions in Alabama and or-
dered a review of the State’s execution protocols after three
lethal injections in a row went wrong. First, in July 2022,
Joe Nathan James, Jr., was concealed behind a curtain for
three hours as medical personnel struggled to establish IV
access. There were no witnesses to what happened other
than those personnel but a state autopsy revealed James
had been punctured multiple times, including at both of his
inner forearms, wrists, and hands, as well as his right foot.
After the curtain between the execution chamber and the
observation room finally lifted, observers reported that
James was nonresponsive. He never spoke the last words
he had allegedly planned.
   Alabama next tried to execute Alan Eugene Miller in Sep-
tember. Beforehand, in an affidavit, the commissioner of
the Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC) swore
that, despite the evident problems with the James execu-
tion, ADOC was “ ‘ready to carry out [Miller’s] sentence by
lethal injection.’ ” ___ F. 4th, at ___, 2023 WL 4622945, *20
(Pryor, J., dissenting). Nevertheless, medical personnel
spent one and a half hours puncturing both of Miller’s el-
bows, arms, and his right hand and foot in an attempt to
establish IV access. Miller reported that a puncture in his
foot “ ‘caused sudden and severe pain’ ” like he “ ‘had been
                  Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023)             3

                    SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

electrocuted,’ ” likely because attempts to access a vein in
his foot hit a nerve. Id., at *19. His “ ‘entire body sh[ook]
in the restraints.’ ” Ibid. Shortly before midnight, when his
death warrant was set to expire, the execution was called
off.
   Just two months later, in November, Alabama tried to ex-
ecute Kenneth Eugene Smith. Medical personnel spent an
hour repeatedly puncturing Smith’s elbows, arms, and
hands in their attempts to locate a vein. Eventually, they
tilted him upside down, bringing his feet above his head.
Smith reported that they began injecting an unknown clear
substance into his neck area. Finally, medical personnel
attempted a central line procedure, which involves trying
to insert a longer catheter into a large vein in the torso be-
fore it enters the heart. The IV team’s move from his ex-
tremities to his collarbone to attempt the central line pro-
cedure terrified Smith because he had no idea what was
happening. The repeated needle insertions in that area felt
like “ ‘stabbing.’ ” Id., at *13. After the central line proce-
dure failed, the execution was called off.
   Four days after Smith’s failed execution, in November
2022, Governor Ivey paused all executions in Alabama, in-
cluding Barber’s. Rather than convene an independent in-
vestigation, as other States had done, see n. 1, infra, the
Governor asked ADOC (the agency responsible for the
faulty executions) to conduct a “ ‘top-to-bottom review’ ” of
the state’s lethal-injection execution process. ___ F. 4th, at
___, 2023 WL 4622945, *13. A little under three months
later, ADOC reported that its review was complete. ADOC
claimed that it was “ ‘as prepared as possible to carry out
death sentences going forward, consistent with the Consti-
tution.’ ” 1 App. to Pet. for Cert. 75a. There was no pub-
lished report. Instead, the ADOC commissioner’s one-and-
a-half page letter to the Governor, without reporting any
flaws or explanations for the prior failures, reported
4                       BARBER v. IVEY

                    SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

ADOC’s decision “ ‘to add to its pool of available medical per-
sonnel for executions,’ ” and that it had “ ‘ordered and ob-
tained new equipment.’ ” ___ F. 4th, at ___, 2023 WL
4622945, *14. The commissioner also noted that ADOC
now had more time to carry out executions. Under new
rules from the Supreme Court of Alabama, death warrants
no longer expire at midnight, but instead last as long as a
“ ‘time frame’ ” set by the Governor permits. Id., at *14, n. 7.
    On the same day ADOC concluded its review, Governor
Ivey moved the Alabama Supreme Court for permission to
set Barber’s execution date. Barber opposed the motion in
state court and asked for discovery into ADOC’s internal
review. After the Alabama Supreme Court denied Barber’s
requests, he filed this case in federal court, alleging that his
Eighth Amendment rights would be violated if Alabama at-
tempted to execute him by lethal injection and requesting
that he instead be executed using nitrogen hypoxia (a state-
approved alternative), which would not require setting an
IV line. Five days later, Governor Ivey set the date for Bar-
ber’s execution on July 20, 2023, which was less than two
months away.
    Barber moved for a preliminary injunction and sought in-
formation about ADOC’s review. He received little re-
sponse other than assertions of privilege and a cursory
statement that the review found “ ‘[n]o deficiencies.’ ” 1 App.
to Pet. for Cert. 175a. The District Court denied Barber’s
motion and he appealed to the Eleventh Circuit, requesting
a stay of his execution. The Eleventh Circuit affirmed the
District Court’s denial of Barber’s motion for a preliminary
injunction and denied his request for a stay. Judge Jill
Pryor dissented, arguing that Barber has “raised a serious
and substantial Eighth Amendment claim that the pattern
[of botched executions] will continue to repeat itself.” ___
F. 4th, at ___, 2023 WL 4622945, *25. I agree with her con-
cerns that ADOC has refused to provide discovery that
could answer crucial questions about what caused past
                  Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023)              5

                    SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

problems with Alabama’s executions and how any changes
would address those specific causes.
                                 II
   The Eighth Amendment prohibits the infliction of “cruel
and unusual punishments.” It forbids “ ‘punishments of tor-
ture, . . . and all others in the same line of unnecessary cru-
elty,’ ” in which “ ‘terror, pain, or disgrace [are] superadded’
to the sentence.” Baze v. Rees, 553 U. S. 35, 48 (2008) (plu-
rality opinion) (quoting Wilkerson v. Utah, 99 U. S. 130,
135–136 (1879)). A method of execution violates the Eighth
Amendment when it causes “a ‘ “substantial risk of serious
harm,” ’ an objectively intolerable risk of harm that pre-
vents prison officials from pleading that they were ‘ “subjec-
tively blameless for purposes of the Eighth Amendment.” ’ ”
Glossip v. Gross, 576 U. S. 863, 877 (2015) (quoting Baze,
553 U. S., at 50). For instance, “ ‘a series of abortive at-
tempts [at execution]’ unlike an ‘innocent misadventure,’
would demonstrate an ‘ “objectively intolerable risk of
harm” ’ that officials may not ignore.” Id., at 50 (plurality
opinion) (citation omitted).
   Barber has alleged that ADOC’s attempt to insert an IV
line to administer lethal injection presents him with a sub-
stantial risk of serious harm based on its track record of
faulty and failed executions. Clearly, something went
wrong in Alabama in 2022. Although much about what
happened is still mysterious, the State had “ ‘a series of
abortive attempts’ ” at execution. Ibid. At the least, medi-
cal personnel in three consecutive executions spent hours
repeatedly puncturing prisoners in increasingly painful at-
tempts to locate a vein for an IV line. They failed entirely
in two of the three instances, despite likely puncturing at
least one man’s nerve. Based on the testimony of the sur-
viving prisoners, these attempts caused “ ‘great pain and
fear,’ ” ___ F. 4th, at ___, 2023 WL 4622945, *19, over and
above what anyone should experience from the setting of an
6                          BARBER v. IVEY

                       SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

IV line.
   Yet the State has never accounted for these issues. There
is no evidence in the record explaining what may have
caused such difficulties. Nor is there evidence that the
State has addressed what went wrong. It has replaced its
IV team with new members, but revealed nothing about
how those members are different from or similar to its 2022
team. It has obtained new medical equipment, which it de-
scribed in its discovery responses as solely “ ‘[a]dditional
straps for securing an inmate on the execution gurney.’ ”
Id., at *14, n. 6. Finally, ADOC has secured several more
hours in which to carry out its executions. These piecemeal
changes appear designed only to ensure that ADOC has an
even greater period of time in which to search the bodies of
its prisoners for IV access. They do not address the unnec-
essary pain those prisoners may experience. Indeed, the
State represented to the District Court that it considered
James’ execution “successful” solely because ultimately it
succeeded in killing him. 2 App. to Pet. for Cert. 454a.
Without any evidence about what went wrong and only the
State’s word that it has been fixed, Barber’s allegations that
he will experience the same “needless suffering” as James,
Miller, and Smith are more than justified.
   Barber is not to blame for the lack of factual development
in his case. Alabama, unlike other States that have sought
to address issues with their lethal injection protocols,1 has
——————
  1 In contrast to Alabama’s cursory and largely secret review, other

States facing a similar history of issues with their executions have con-
ducted thorough investigations resulting in public reports. For example,
in October 2015, the Oklahoma Attorney General asked for a pause in
executions. He convened a 77-county grand jury to investigate issues
with two lethal injection attempts. The grand jury received evidence
over eight months and issued an over 100-page report detailing specific
failures with the execution attempts. See Oklahoma Office of the Attor-
ney General, Press Release, AG Pruitt Announces Conclusion of MCGJ
Investigation of DOC, Execution Protocol (May 19, 2016). Similarly, in
May 2022, the Tennessee Governor appointed U. S. Attorney Ed Stanton
                     Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023)                     7

                       SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

conducted a secret, internal review with no published re-
port or finding. The State has not only failed publicly to
account for what went wrong, but also actively obstructed
Barber’s attempts to find out what happened. Because Gov-
ernor Ivey set Barber’s execution for a date only two months
after he filed his complaint, discovery was necessarily
abridged and the State, within that abridged discovery, pro-
vided hardly any information about its investigation or its
new process.
   After an unbroken sequence of faulty executions, Ala-
bama asks the Court to trust that this time will be different.
If it takes hours to set Barber’s IV line, like Miller and
Smith before him, the State may subject Barber to an intol-
erable level of pain under the Eighth Amendment. If it suc-
cessfully executes him anyway, like James, it will have
mooted his claim. The Eighth Amendment does not tolerate
playing such games with a man’s life. I, like Judge Pryor,
would stay Barber’s execution for long enough to allow the
district court to complete full discovery into what went
wrong with the 2022 executions and what has been done to
address it. Only then can it make an informed decision
about the merits of Barber’s Eighth Amendment claim.
                          III
  Today’s decision is another troubling example of this

——————
to conduct an independent review of the State’s execution process. The
review produced a 166-page independent report that detailed the inves-
tigation’s methodology and scope, the issues with a specific scheduled
execution, and detailed findings and recommendations. See Butler Snow
LLP, Tennessee Lethal Injection Protocol Investigation: Report & Find-
ings (Dec. 13, 2022). Most recently, in January 2023, the Arizona Gov-
ernor established a Death Penalty Independent Review Commissioner
tasked with reviewing the State’s execution protocols after alleged issues
inserting an IV line during three recent executions. Arizona, Executive
Order No. 2023–05, Establishing a Death Penalty Independent Review
Commissioner; see J. Jenkins, States Under Scrutiny for Recent Lethal
Injection Failures, Arizona Republic (Nov. 22, 2022).
8                          BARBER v. IVEY

                       SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

Court stymying the development of Eighth Amendment law
by pushing forward executions without complete infor-
mation. In both Miller and Smith’s cases, this Court issued
unreasoned orders vacating long, well-reasoned stays is-
sued by the Eleventh Circuit.2 See Hamm v. Miller, 598
U. S. ___ (2022); Hamm v. Smith, 598 U. S. ___ (2022). Both
Miller and Smith argued that Alabama would likely botch
their execution just as it had botched preceding executions.
They were both right. Had this Court not vacated the Elev-
enth Circuit’s stays, perhaps the State would have been
forced to produce evidence in discovery that could explain
what kept going wrong and avoided inflicting unnecessary
pain on these two men.
   This Court has so prioritized expeditious executions that
it has disregarded well-reasoned lower court conclusions,
preventing both the meaningful airing of prisoners’ chal-
lenges and the development of Eighth Amendment law. Cf.
United States v. Higgs, 592 U. S. ___ (2021) (SOTOMAYOR,
J., dissenting) (slip op., at 2) (“The Court has . . . intervened
to lift stays of execution that lower courts put in place,
thereby ensuring those prisoners’ challenges [to a new fed-
eral execution protocol] would never receive a meaningful
airing”). Unfortunately, lower courts are receiving the mes-
sage. The Eleventh Circuit here made both factual and le-

——————
   2 In Miller’s case, the District Court had issued a preliminary injunc-

tion, which the Eleventh Circuit upheld in a 20-page opinion. Miller v.
Comm’r, Ala. Dept. of Corrections, No. 22–13136, ECF Doc. 19–1, p. 20
(CA11, Sept. 22, 2022) (per curiam). In Smith’s case, the Eleventh Cir-
cuit reversed the District Court’s denial of his motion to amend his com-
plaint in a long, well-reasoned opinion holding that he had stated a plau-
sible Eighth Amendment claim to relief. Smith v. Comm’r, Alabama
Dep’t of Corrections, No. 22–13781, 2022 WL 17069492 (CA11 Nov. 17,
2022) (per curiam), cert. denied, 598 U. S. ___ (2023). Hours later, the
Eleventh Circuit granted Smith a stay of his execution to allow him to
pursue that claim. Smith v. Comm’r, Ala. Dept. of Corrections, No. 22–
13846, ECF Doc. 10–1 (CA11, Nov. 17, 2022).
                  Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023)            9

                   SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

gal errors seemingly based on this Court’s unreasoned va-
caturs.
   First, in denying Barber’s request for a stay, the Eleventh
Circuit emphasized that this Court had previously vacated
its grant of Smith’s stay. “By vacating the stay,” the panel
reasoned, “the Supreme Court implicitly told us that the
balance of equities in Smith weighed in favor of the State’s
and the victim’s strong interest.” ___ F. 4th, at ___, n. 19,
2023 WL 4622945, *8, n. 19 (majority opinion). That is
plainly wrong. Under well-established equitable principles,
courts evaluating a stay must consider the applicant’s like-
lihood of success on the merits and potential for irreparable
injury, as well as other parties’ injury and the public inter-
est. See Nken v. Holder, 556 U. S. 418, 434 (2009). Barber
has established a substantial likelihood of success on the
merits of his claim that he will suffer a substantial risk of
harm when ADOC attempts to set his IV line. Barber sub-
mitted evidence that Alabama has subjected three prison-
ers to unnecessary pain and terror through its struggles to
set their IV lines during lethal injection executions. The
State has failed to produce any evidence that it has identi-
fied or remedied these problems. Additionally, in a capital
case like Barber’s, where a plaintiff has diligently pursued
his method-of-execution claim and asked only for an injunc-
tion that permits an alternative, available method of execu-
tion, the equities of irreparable harm tip strongly in his fa-
vor. See Bucklew v. Precythe, 587 U. S. ___, (2019)
(SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting) (slip op., at 3) (“[T]he equities
in a death penalty case will almost always favor the pris-
oner so long as he or she can show a reasonable probability
of success on the merits”). For the State, the harm is using
an alternative method of execution that it has already ap-
proved. It can still vindicate its interest in enforcing the
criminal judgment. Far more consequentially for the plain-
tiff, the potential harm is experiencing excruciating and un-
necessary pain.
10                      BARBER v. IVEY

                    SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

   Second, the Eleventh Circuit appears to have concluded
that “repeatedly and futilely pricking an inmate with a nee-
dle does not rise to an unconstitutional level of pain.” ___
F. 4th, at ___, n. 20, 2023 WL 4622945, *8, n. 20 (majority
opinion); see id., at 19 (Pryor, J., dissenting). This Court’s
precedent forecloses any such categorical rule. Whether a
given method of execution creates a “substantial risk of se-
rious harm” is a fact-intensive inquiry. A court must ana-
lyze whether a given method “ ‘creates a demonstrated risk
of severe pain’ ” to a particular plaintiff. Glossip, 576 U. S.,
at 878 (quoting Baze, 553 U. S., at 61 (plurality opinion)).
Evidence of past faulty or failed executions is relevant to
that analysis. Id., at 50. So is the potential pain or suffer-
ing caused by the suggested alternative. See Bucklew v.
Precythe, 587 U. S. ___, ___ (2019) (slip op., at ___). Here,
the District Court would have needed several kinds of in-
formation to assess the risk of serious harm resulting from
setting an IV line. At a minimum, it had to know ADOC’s
standard process for setting IV lines, including the exper-
tise of the team setting the line. For instance, if an IV team
contains no one with meaningful experience setting hard-
to-access IV lines, that would be relevant to the risk of se-
rious harm if the team tries to insert one in any context.
Only then could it know the impact and relevance of any of
Barber’s additional risk factors on his potential to experi-
ence unnecessary pain.
   The Eleventh Circuit’s categorical rule ignores crucial
Eighth Amendment questions. How much pain or psycho-
logical torment amounts to serious harm? How long is too
long to set an IV line? How many punctures with a needle,
where, and how deeply, may cause superadded pain? These
questions require a factual foundation, developed with the
assistance of medical experts. The answers may be differ-
ent in different cases, under different protocols, and with
different people.
                 Cite as: 600 U. S. ____ (2023)          11

                  SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting

  If the Court continues to endorse state executions sched-
uled before meaningful discovery, these questions may
never be answered. The harm is not speculative. Miller
and Smith survived to describe the intense fear and pain
they experienced during Alabama’s tortuous attempts to ex-
ecute them. This Court’s intervention lifting stays granted
by the Eleventh Circuit permitted those attempts. This
Court’s decision denying Barber’s request for a stay allows
Alabama to experiment again with a human life. I respect-
fully dissent.