U.S. judge blocks sale of controversial execution drug to Missouri

[unhappycamper]

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/02/13/u-s-judge-blocks-sale-of-controversial-execution-drug-to-missouri/



U.S. judge blocks sale of controversial execution drug to Missouri
By Reuters
Thursday, February 13, 2014 3:14 EST

A U.S. judge on Wednesday temporarily blocked a pharmacy from providing a compound execution drug to Missouri jailers to use in the February 26 lethal injection of Michael Taylor, guilty in the death of a 15-year-old girl.

Missouri and several other U.S. states that have the death penalty have increasingly been forced to look for alternate drugs and sources of drugs for executions as pharmaceutical companies have raised objections to their products being used in capital punishment.

Some states have turned to so-called compounding pharmacies, which produce small amounts of drugs by prescription and are not regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, prompting defense attorneys to question the quality of the drugs and whether they could cause undue pain during an execution.

U.S. District Court Judge Terence Kern on Wednesday afternoon granted a temporary restraining order preventing one such pharmacy, The Apothecary Shoppe, from supplying compounded pentobarbital to the Missouri Department of Corrections.