St. Louis Post-Dispatch
ST. LOUIS — A Cole County circuit judge has ruled — for the third time — that the Missouri Department of Corrections is violating the state’s Sunshine Law by refusing to disclose the source of the drugs it uses in lethal injections.
The state appealed similar rulings by Judge Jon E. Beetem last year. There’s no reason to expect it will abide by the one handed down Monday in a case brought by the Post-Dispatch and other state and national news organizations. Since the lawsuits were filed in May 2014, 12 men have been executed with stealth drugs.
There’s a terrible irony in this. The Department of Corrections, with help from Gov. Jay Nixon and Attorney General Chris Koster, is choosing to ignore the law in administering the ultimate punishment for breaking the law. Whatever the difference between open records laws and homicide laws, the disdain for the rule of law is the same.
Missouri began using the barbiturate pentobarbital for executions in late 2013 after a series of foul-ups with other drugs. U.S. manufacturers won’t sell pentobarbital for use in capital punishment, so some states turned to compounding pharmacies to make small batches.
A year ago, Missouri officials said they had enough of the drug for 16 executions. But compounded pentobarbital has a shelf-life of only 45 days. In a court filing last April, Koster wrote, “Missouri uses pentobarbital as the lethal chemical in its execution process, but does not admit nor deny the chemical now used is compounded as opposed to manufactured.”
The only other possible sources are foreign manufacturers or U.S. drugs made for veterinary euthanasia. Beetem ruled that the public has a right to know not only the supplier, but to see the quality-control tests run on the drugs and related correspondence.
The state consistently has claimed that the drug manufacturer, whoever or whatever it might be, is part of its execution team. State law says the names of team members can stay secret. To protect this anonymity, they’re paid in cash. The drug supplier gets $7,178.88. The state doesn’t bother filing forms 1099 with the Internal Revenue Service — yet another violation of the law.
In the past decade, the corrections department employed a dyslexic doctor who admitted he sometimes winged it when mixing lethal drugs. The department almost caused a nationwide shortage of a vital hospital anesthetic by refusing to return a mistaken shipment to a supplier. It executed one man before judges had completed their review of his case.
Regardless of their views on the death penalty, Missourians should agree that if the state can’t carry it out in an open and honest manner, it should get out of the business altogether.
Copyright 2016 the St. Louis Post-Dispatch