FRANKFORT, Ky. — Kentucky may not execute anyone until it
adopts regulations in compliance with the law, the Kentucky Supreme Court ruled
Wednesday.
The court ruling came in the case of three Death Row inmates
— Thomas C. Bowling, Ralph Baze and Brian Keith Moore — who were challenging
the state’s lethal injection protocol.
Bowling was convicted and sentenced to death for the 1990
murders of a husband and wife as they were parked in their car outside their
dry cleaning business in Lexington.
Baze was convicted and sentenced to death for the 1992
murders of two police officers who were attempting to serve five fugitive
warrants on him in Powell County.
Earlier this week, Attorney General Jack Conway asked
Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear to set an execution date for Baze and two other men
on Death Row.
Meanwhile, the state’s top public defenders, a leading
anti-death-penalty group and a group of lawyers sought a moratorium on
executions until a recently organized American Bar Association review of the
implementation of the death penalty in Kentucky is completed in about 12 to 18
months.
In its 35-page ruling, the court said the state Department
of Corrections must follow state-mandated administrative procedures before
adopting the current lethal injection process of a three-drug cocktail.
It also said the state should have held public hearings on
the process.
“The Department of Corrections is required by Kentucky
law to promulgate a regulation as to all portions of the lethal injection
protocol except those limited issues of internal management that are purely of
concern to department personnel,” the high court said.
It identified “limited issues of internal
management” as identities of the execution team, storage location of the
drugs and other security-related issues.
Via McClatchy-Tribune News Service.
