Assembly OKs Lethal Injection Death Penalty

Death Row inmates would be able to choose death by injection rather than the gas chamber under a bill given final Assembly approval Tuesday and sent to the governor.

Under the measure, by Assemblyman Tom McClintock (R-Thousand Oaks), California would join 22 other states that either require that capital punishment be carried out by intravenous injection or give prisoners a choice between injection and some other form of execution.

The bill was approved on a 47-1 vote after a brief discussion and no real debate.

McClintock, responding to a question about a botched execution by injection in Texas, assured his colleagues that lethal injection is a humane option and “an improvement” over the gas chamber, which was first used in California more than 50 years ago.

“The first part of this protocol is no different than preparing for surgery,” he said.

McClintock introduced the bill in April, just hours after double-murderer Robert Alton Harris became the first inmate put to death in California in 25 years.

The American Civil Liberties Union, in a last-minute appeal on behalf of Harris, contended that the use of cyanide gas is cruel and unusual punishment, prohibited by the U.S. Constitution.

Even though the appeal was unsuccessful, McClintock advocated giving condemned prisoners the choice of death by injection as a way to avoid similar legal challenges in the future.

The legislation was opposed by the Friends Committee on Legislation, which argued that death by injection is not humane.

Backers of lethal injection contend that the method is faster, cheaper and less painful than cyanide gas, which blocks the uptake of oxygen--essentially asphyxiating the prisoner. Using the alternative method, the prisoner is given an intravenous injection of a drug that brings on unconsciousness along with other drugs that cause death.