LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) – A judge was weighing Friday whether to block Arkansas’ seven upcoming executions, set to begin next week, as a medical supplier said one of the three drugs the state plans to use to put the prisoners to death wasn’t sold to be used for lethal injection.
Two pharmaceutical companies on Thursday filed a court brief seeking to halt the executions, while San Francisco-based medical supply company McKesson said it sold Arkansas one drug believing it would be used for medical purposes.
Under Arkansas’ protocol, midazolam is used to sedate the inmate, vecuronium bromide then stops the inmate’s breathing and potassium chloride stops the heart.
Arkansas plans to execute seven inmates before the end of April, when its supply of midazolam expires. Meanwhile, hundreds of people gathered outside the Arkansas Capitol on Friday to protest the state’s plan, including the actor Johnny Depp and former Arkansas death row inmate Damien Echols, who was freed in 2011.
U.S. District Judge Kristine Baker is considering the inmates’ arguments that such a compressed schedule could lead to undue pain and suffering, as well as the drugmakers’ desire that their products not be used for capital punishment.