A pharmacy in Oklahoma has agreed not to give Missouri a drug to use for a convicted rapist-murderer's execution after the man’s lawyers filed a case against the pharmacy, hoping to stop the business from providing the drug, the Associated Press reports.
Part of the deal included the pharmacy's acknowledgment that it had not already given the drug to the Missouri Department of Corrections for the Feb. 26 execution of Michael Taylor. In 1989 Taylor pleaded guilty to abducting, raping and then murdering a 15-year-old girl from Kansas City.
The Apothecary Shoppe in Tulsa did not say whether or not it regularly supplies a compounded version of pentobarbital to Missouri for use in executions because Missouri law mandates the confidentiality of the execution team's identities.
Taylor's lawsuit accuses the state of getting a compounded form of pentobarbital from the pharmacy because the only licensed manufacturer of the product refuses to provide it for execution, AP notes. It was a condition the Illinois-based company agreed to when it bought the exclusive rights to the drug in early 2012 from a Danish company.
In his lawsuit Taylor also states that recent executions in which the compounded drug was used show that it would probably cause him "severe, unnecessary, lingering and ultimately inhumane pain." The suit points to a case from last month, plus one from 2012, in which inmates showed signs of distress during their executions, AP reports.
The lawsuit also raises the issue of whether the pharmacy can legally provide the drug. Because the Apothecary Shoppe is not registered as a drug manufacturer with the Food and Drug Administration, the claim is that it violates federal law when it delivers the drug across state lines.
Read more at Yahoo! News.