Lethal injection drugs are in short supply thanks to a combination of factors including manufacturing difficulties, distribution restrictions by drug companies, and legal battles in which opponents of capital punishment use specific drug cocktails as a vehicle for cruel and unusual punishment cases. To bypass the execution delays this state of affairs has produced, Arizona's latest capital punishment protocols, published in January, suggest attorneys for death-row inmates can provide the drugs themselves:
If the inmate's counsel or other third parties acting on behalf of the inmate's counsel are able to obtain from a certified or licensed pharmacist, pharmacy, compound pharmacy, manufacturer, or supplier and provide to the Department the chemical pentobarbital in sufficient quantity and quality to successfully implement the one-drug protocol with pentobarbital set forth in Chart A, then the Director shall use the one-drug protocol with pentobarbital set forth in Chart A as the drug protocol for execution. [Arizona Department of Corrections]
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