[Deathpenalty] death penalty news----PENN., USA

[Rick Halperin]

March 24



PENNSYLVANIA:

Westmoreland DA intends to seek death penalty in police officer's fatal 
shooting----Ray Shetler Jr., of New Florence, charged with killing Officer 
Lloyd Reed


The Westmoreland County district attorney has filed a notice of intent to seek 
the death penalty for a man accused of shooting and killing a St. Clair 
Township police officer.

Ray Shetler Jr., 31, is charged with criminal homicide and is awaiting trial in 
the death of Officer Lloyd Reed, who was shot while responding to a domestic 
dispute Nov. 28.

District Attorney John Peck notified the court Thursday that his office will 
ask the jury to sentence Shetler to death if the New Florence man is convicted 
of 1st-degree murder.

State police have said Reed was shot with a rifle when he responded to a call 
at the home of Shetler's girlfriend in New Florence.

(source: WTAE news)






USA:

How to kill: America's death penalty dilemma


With supplies of lethal injection drugs running low and new sources 
increasingly difficult to come by, states are grappling with alternatives. 
Virginia is the latest.

Its solution: Bring back the electric chair.

The bill has passed the state House and Senate, and now awaits the governor's 
signature.

Here is how the United States got to this point:

Opposition to the death penalty is rising ...

In 1994, Gallup found that 80% of Americans supported the death penalty. 
Fast-forward to today: A poll last October showed the support had fallen to 
61%.

... and more states are putting executions on hold

Those are in addition to the 19 states and the District of Columbia, which have 
outlawed capital punishment. Since 2009 alone, Connecticut, Illinois, Maryland, 
Nebraska and New Mexico have abolished the death penalty.

But capital punishment isn't on its way out

Not by a long shot. In just the last 6 years, 17 states have executed 242 
inmates. That's as of March 24. 3 states account for more than 1/2 of those: 
Texas, Florida and Oklahoma.

The most common method? Lethal injection

Lethal injection is the primary means of execution in all 31 death penalty 
states. In 1982, Texas became the 1st state to execute an offender via lethal 
injection. Since then, the United States has carried out 1,425 executions, and 
only 171 have relied on another method.

But the drugs are drying up ...

Lethal injection initially required a 3\\-drug cocktail: The 1st (sodium 
thiopental or pentobarbital) puts the prisoner to sleep, the 2nd (pancuronium 
bromide) brings on paralysis, and the final agent (potassium chloride) stops 
the heart.

In 2010, European drug manufacturers began to ban exports of the cocktail 
ingredients to the United States. The following year, concerned about the use 
of sodium thiopental in executions, Illinois-based Hospira stopped making the 
drug, and Denmark-based Lundbeck banned U.S. prisons from using its 
pentobarbital. The United Kingdom also introduced a ban on exporting sodium 
thiopental, and the European Union took an official stance in 2012 with its 
Regulation on Products used for Capital Punishment and Torture.

... forcing states to scramble for new cocktails

Death penalty states began looking for alternatives. Among them: procuring the 
drugs from alternative sources, devising a 1-drug method, employing other drugs 
such as midazolam or propofol, and using controversial compounding pharmacies 
to manufacture the drugs.

This has spurred a cascade of lawsuits

Such lawsuits saw a significant uptick in 2014. That's the same year numerous 
executions, all employing midazolam, were widely considered botched. In Ohio, 
Dennis McGuire gasped and convulsed for 10 minutes before dying. In Arizona, 
Joseph Wood snorted and gulped for air as he died over a period of 2 hours. And 
in Oklahoma, Clayton Lockett writhed for 43 minutes before succumbing to a 
heart attack.

After each of those cases, states issued holds on capital punishment while the 
processes were reviewed. Attorneys for death row inmates in several states have 
also used these botched efforts to challenge the constitutionality of their 
clients' executions.

Now, states are looking at alternatives ...

In 2014, Tennessee said that when lethal injection drugs can't be found, the 
state can use the electric chair. The next year, Utah successfully passed 
legislation to reintroduce firing squads.

14 other states have a secondary means -- Oklahoma actually has 3 -- but in 
those states, inmates must opt for them.

... which brings us back to Virginia

Virginia used electrocution exclusively until 1995, when the state began 
permitting death row inmates to choose between the chair and lethal injection. 
Since then, 7 condemned men have opted to die by electrocution.

But those were the exceptions. The majority of Virginia's 87 executions since 
1995 -- as in the rest of the country -- were carried out via lethal injection.

Gov. Terry McAuliffe hasn't said whether he will sign the bill, and as of 
Wednesday, 3 members of his communications staff hadn't responded to CNN 
inquiries about whether he would.

But, with drugs becoming increasingly harder to come by, more states will have 
to tackle this challenge soon.

(source: CNN)