New rules bring California a step closer to resuming executions
By Sharon Bernstein SACRAMENTO, Calif. (Reuters) - California published its proposed rules for lethal injection of condemned prisoners on Friday, moving the state a step closer to resuming executions after putting them on hold for nearly a decade. The proposed regulations, released for public comment Friday morning, would instruct prison officials to use a single drug for lethal injections, rather than the three-drug cocktail that was declared unconstitutional by a California court because it may not block pain to the recipient. The state, the most populous in the country and a Democratic stronghold where public support for the death penalty has been slipping for years, stopped executing prisoners after Clarence Ray Allen was put to death nearly 10 years ago for three murders in Fresno. Since then, legal challenges have prevented further executions, the state said in its overview of the new rules, beginning with a judge's ruling in late 2006 that the three-drug cocktail used for executions raised an "impermissible" risk of violating the U.S. Constitution's prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment. For years, the state fought rulings that the three-drug cocktail was now allowed, but earlier this year agreed to develop a single-drug protocol in accordance with a 2010 judge's order. But juries have continued to sentence defendants to die, sending 181 felons to death row since Allen's execution in January 2006. However, it was not immediately clear when - or whether - the state would resume executions. Since California law authorizes the use of the death penalty, corrections officials must develop a legal protocol for administering it, said Terry Thornton, a spokeswoman for the administration of Democratic Governor Jerry Brown. But politicians in California also have not had the stomach to force the issue in a state where many top officeholders, including the attorney general, oppose the death penalty. A slim majority of voters, about 56 percent, support it, the lowest number in years, according to a Field Poll last year. Even before the court blocked the three-drug cocktail in 2010, the pace of executions in California was slow, with just 13 people executed from 1978, when the death penalty was reinstated, to 2006. Brown has been quiet on the issue, and Thornton on Friday did not indicate how that state would proceed. "It is premature to speculate on when executions might resume," she said. Still awaiting execution are 747 prisoners who have been condemned since 1978. Sixty-nine inmates have died of natural causes while on death row and 24 have committed suicide. A public hearing on the proposed lethal injection protocol is set for Jan. 22, the state said. (Reporting by Sharon Bernstein; Editing by Frances Kerry and Lisa Shumaker)
