Denno on Lethal Injection

On SSRN:

"The Lethal Injection Debate: Law and Science"

Fordham Urban Law Journal, Vol. 35, No. 701, 2008
Fordham Law Legal Studies Research Paper No. 1175343

DEBORAH W. DENNO, Fordham University School of Law
On April 16, 2008, for the first time in decades, the United States Supreme Court reviewed evidence concerning whether a state's method of execution violated the Eighth Amendment's Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause. In Baze v. Rees, a 7-2 plurality ruling, the Court upheld the constitutionality of Kentucky's method of executing inmates by lethal injection, determining that Kentucky's administration of a three-drug combination used by most death penalty states did not pose a "substantial" or "objectively intolerable" risk of "serious harm" to inmates. While the road leading to Baze is well traveled with lethal injection litigation, post-Baze, there appear to be many more litigation miles still to go. There is no better background for attempting to assess the future direction of Baze than the Fordham Urban Law Journal's symposium issue, The Lethal Injection Debate: Law and Science. This forum, the first of its kind on this topic, reflects the latest balanced perspective on the legal, medical, and ethical concerns over lethal injection from some of the country's leading experts. Likewise, this Introduction discussses the ways the symposium's ten articles provide the proper insight and context for determining how the Baze Court's Eighth Amendment standards will apply in practice.