JURIST - Paper Chase: Florida governor suspends all executions after botched lethal injection

[JURIST] Florida Governor Jeb Bush [official website] suspended all executions in the state Friday after a medical examiner said that the execution of Angel Diaz [Amnesty profile] earlier this week was botched. Diaz endured a 34-minute-long execution and medical examiner Dr. William Hamilton said Friday that preliminary autopsy results showed that a second injection was required in the execution because needles were improperly inserted into the flesh of Diaz's arm during the first injection. Hamilton did not specify whether he believed Diaz suffered a painful death. Bush appointed a commission to study Florida's lethal injections procedures [PDF text] and the governor halted the signing of death warrants until the commission submits its report.

After the botched execution Wednesday, death penalty [JURIST news archive] critics filed an emergency petition [PDF text] with the Florida Supreme Court seeking to once again halt the death penalty in the state. Petitioners, including numerous people currently on Florida's death row roster [text], asked the court to exercise its All Writs jurisdiction and declare that the state's lethal injections procedures violate the Eighth Amendment [text] of the US Constitution. AP has more.

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