News
Paul Dennis Reid
As the U.S. Supreme Court prepares to consider whether the prevailing method of lethal injection in this country is constitutional, Tennessee officials are forging ahead with plans to execute two death row inmates in the next two months, even while other states have halted such killings pending a high court decision.
Gov. Phil Bredesen doesn’t intend to postpone the executions of Pervis Payne on Dec. 12, or Paul Dennis Reid on Jan. 3, even though the lethal injection method that would be used is under scrutiny and won’t be ruled upon by the Supreme Court until the spring.
“I have not put any stop to them, and our own Supreme Court has ruled that it is constitutional,” Bredesen told reporters following a speaking engagement at the Marriott in Cool Springs earlier this month. “My current intention is to proceed ahead with processing what Tennessee law says you’re supposed to do.”
Although Bredesen doesn’t plan to intervene, he suspects the federal courts might preclude any further lethal injections until the U.S. Supreme Court rules this spring. “I don’t know that for sure yet, but it’s sure looking that way.”
Given that Tennessee’s attorney general appears equally as committed to proceeding as scheduled, and that the state Supreme Court has refused to stay the upcoming executions, the federal courts are almost certainly the last resort for reprieve, as was the case for death row inmate Edward Harbison.
In September, a federal judge in Nashville declared the three-drug lethal injection procedure cruel and unusual and barred the state from using it to execute Harbison, who was scheduled to die Jan. 9. The state appealed the judge’s ruling to the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which on Oct. 31 stayed Harbison’s case until the U.S. Supreme Court rules on the issue.
Now attorneys for both Payne and Reid are challenging the constitutionality of the controversial three-drug protocol in federal court in an effort to save their clients. Payne faces execution for the 1987 slaying of a 28-year-old woman and her 2-year-old daughter, and Reid faces seven death sentences for a 1997 murder spree that left seven fast food restaurant workers dead.
Local death penalty opponents are hopeful the federal courts at some level will temporarily stay the two executions, but they’re quick to acknowledge there’s no guarantee.
“I think there is uncertainty, and as much as I’d love to say we can count on no executions at least until the spring, I don’t think we can say that,” says Stacy Rector, director of the Tennessee Coalition to Abolish State Killing. “You can’t let your guard down too much because things are changing every day.”
That uncertainty mounted this week as the execution of Florida death row inmate Mark Schwab approached. As of press deadline Tuesday, Schwab still was scheduled to die by lethal injection Thursday after the Florida Supreme Court denied the prisoner’s request for a stay, leaving his fate in the hands of the federal courts. If the death sentence is carried out as planned, it would be the second execution in the United States since the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to review the case of a Kentucky prisoner challenging the three-drug cocktail used to perform lethal injections in most states, including Tennessee.
The lethal injection procedure in question includes a series of three chemicals: a barbiturate, a muscle-paralyzing agent and a poison found in road salt that stops the heart. Critics of the method say there’s too much room for error, pointing out that the paralytic might result in an inmate enduring excruciating pain unbeknownst to anyone.
On Sept. 25, just hours after agreeing to consider the Kentucky case, the U.S. Supreme Court allowed a lethal injection to be carried out in Texas. But since then, the high court has granted last-minute stays to three inmates who were denied relief by lower courts.
Pervis T. Payne
And although the Supreme Court’s recent actions are considered a signal to states to hold off on further lethal injections until the Kentucky case is decided, Tennessee is among several states still fighting to carry out executions.
“The pending executions have been scheduled by order of the Tennessee Supreme Court. Unless those orders are stayed, our office has a duty to enforce them,” says Sharon Curtis-Flair, spokeswoman for state Attorney General Robert Cooper, who declined to be interviewed for this story.
Meanwhile, prosecutors in some states, including Texas—which executes far more inmates than any other state—have sought to postpone upcoming executions pending the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling.
And while state courts across the country have halted nearly a dozen executions due to unresolved concerns about lethal injection, the Tennessee Supreme Court has, without explanation, refused to reschedule the upcoming lethal injections of Payne and Reid.
“The Tennessee Supreme Court so far has refused to budge, presumably because they see a possibility that those executions may go forward,” says one local defense attorney who frequently handles death penalty cases. “I think Tennessee stands out in stark contrast from other states that have put a hold on executions while awaiting the outcome of [the Kentucky case]. In fact, the state courts in Tennessee are probably among the more aggressive courts in the country right now when it comes to enforcing the death penalty.”
A handful of state lawmakers have voiced their belief that the scheduled executions should go forward. Tennessee Rep. Jason Mumpower, a Bristol Republican, says he believes there are two alternative methods of execution available, suggesting the state could either alter its lethal injection protocol to use only one drug, or possibly use the electric chair as a backup method.
“The legal process that criminals are afforded is oftentimes another period of agony for the families of the victims who were killed. By the time we reach the end of that process, the time for justice is at hand,” Mumpower says. “I think we owe nothing less to the families of the people who were killed by these criminals.”Tennessee Supreme Court Justice William Koch Jr. issued an opinion in September stating that electrocution was a viable option, although the governor has since disagreed. Last week, the attorney general concurred with the governor, saying the electric chair is not a legal means of execution in these cases.
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