The Dropping of Ohio's Execution Secrecy Curtain Could Have a Wide Impact

Ohio lawmakers passed a controversial and secretive execution law this week that clears the path for state prisons to resume lethal injections, while allowing prisons to shield the identities of pharmaceutical companies supplying lethal injections drugs.

Ohio's decision, which passed 58-22 in the lower house Wednesday, could also impact other states such as Oklahoma, where authorities are currently weighing their own capital punishment procedures in the wake of a series of gruesomely botched executions.

House Bill 663 — which has been kicked back and forth between the state legislatures — was introduced with the intention of jumpstarting executions after they were halted in May following the grisly execution of Dennis McGuire, who writhed and choked for 26 minutes after being injected by an experimental cocktail of lethal drugs.

As well as protecting the identities of drug makers for 20 years, the bill would also cordon off other aspect of the execution process — such as the names of medical and team members in the death chamber and transportation of drugs — from the public, courts, and reporters.

Maybe it's time to stop letting states experiment with secret death drugs. Read more here.

State prisons and corrections facilities across the US that administer the death penalty have increasingly been forced to use untested combinations of drugs on inmates after pharmaceutical companies in America and abroad have withdrawn their supplies of lethal injection drugs, citing ethical or public relations concerns.

One of the bill's sponsors, Ohio State Representative Matt Huffman (R), told VICE News before the legislation was approved that, "Someone has to supply these drugs and they don't want to do it if the public knows."

"Allowing anonymity will allow us to go forward with these executions. It's how we are going to accomplish the task," he said.

Rights advocates have vehemently protested the bill, saying the secretive law is a blight on the public's right to know and could essentially sanction more botched executions. As a result, lawmakers and activists alike expect a pushback against the Ohio legislature's decision.

"Ohio is unusual because there is a public debate on whether this information should be secret," Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center told Reuters. "The law is not going to immediately resolve things. There will be questions about the law being constitutional."

Similar laws that have already come into effect in five other states are being challenged along these lines at present — including in Texas, where a court last week forced state prisons to release the name of a supplier providing drugs in its lethal injection cocktail.

But Ohio lawmakers have argued that the secrecy laws will bring drug makers back on board, and facilitate the reintroduction of tried and tested drugs traditionally used in most death penalty states.

The Ohio bill, which must still be signed into law by the governor, could have an impact on other states, like Oklahoma, which is currently determining its own execution procedures after a similarly macabre death chamber incident there in April resulted in a "bloody mess" and suspension of all further lethal injections.

Documents reveal 'bloody mess' at botched Oklahoma execution of Clayton Lockett. Read more here.

Court documents filed last week in the April 29 execution of Oklahoma inmate Clayton Lockett revealed he moaned and gasped for 43 minutes after being injected with an experimental cocktail of Midazolam, vecuronium bromide, and potassium chloride.

Lockett's attorney claims in the documents the prison used the wrong length IV needle and had to insert it into the prisoner 16 times when the drugs failed to kill him immediately. A senior corrections official also admitted he had doubts about the effectiveness of the drugs and conducted his own research on "Wiki leaks" — apparently referring to Wikipedia — before finally deducing that Midazolam, "would render a person unconscious … So we thought it was okay."

Midazolam, a drug that has only recently been introduced for use in lethal injection cocktails in the US, was also used in McGuire's problematic January execution in Ohio.

This week, Oklahoma began federal court hearings into whether state executions would be able to resume in the wake of Lockett's execution, which one witness described as "like a horror movie."

While the state altered its lethal injections procedures following Lockett's execution, lawyers for 21 inmates currently on death row say the new measures are still untested and would induce "cruel and unusual" punishment on their clients and is a clear violation of the US constitution, the Guardian reported.

Prison authorities maintain the system's new and improved guidelines and training for staff would prevent more botched executions. Under the guidelines, the state will now allow four different drug cocktails to be used in executions. Two of them include Midazolam at quantities five times higher than in the combination used on Lockett.

Ohio just doubled down on drug cocktail that tortured a death row inmate before killing him. Read more here.

Follow Liz Fields on Twitter: @lianzifields

VICE News' Alice Speri and Payton Guion contributed to this report.