Nebraska just became the first state to carry out an execution using fentanyl

Officials in Nebraska used fentanyl to execute a felon Tuesday, the first time the drug was ever used in an execution in the U.S., reports The New York Times.

Carey Dean Moore, 60, was convicted of killing two taxi drivers in 1979, and the state went forward with the controversial decision to execute him by lethal injection at the Nebraska State Penitentiary. The Times reports that officials used a mixture of four different drugs, which had never before been tested. The mixture included a tranquilizer, a muscle relaxant, potassium chloride to stop the heart, and fentanyl, a synthetic opioid that has garnered attention in the nation's rising opioid epidemic.

On Monday, a federal appeals court rejected an attempt by the German pharmaceutical company Fresenius Kabi to stop the execution; Fresenius Kabi said two of its drugs, the muscle relaxant and potassium chloride, would be used in the lethal cocktail, but claimed Nebraska obtained the drugs illegally, The Guardian reports. The drug company argued that the drugs had been improperly stored, which could lead to a painful execution.

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Reporters who were in the room said the execution didn't appear to have any complications, with Moore mouthing "I love you" to his chosen witnesses, then breathing heavily and coughing before his death. It was the first execution in Nebraska since 1997, when state officials used an electric chair to carry out the death penalty. Read more at The New York Times.