Kentucky to Change Execution Method

WKMS | By The Associated Press

Published June 1, 2012 at 10:30 AM CDT

Kentucky will change the way it executes prisoners after a judge ordered it to rethink the current injection process that involves three drugs.

The move could mean a switch to a single-drug execution. The state Justice Cabinet filed notice Thursday in Franklin Circuit Court that it would propose new regulations by July 24^th. In April, Franklin Circuit Judge Phillip Shepherd gave Kentucky 90 days to make changes or face a trial to defend the three-drug method. Shepherd ruled that if the Commonwealth moves to a one-drug execution, any cruel and unusual punishment arguments raised by death row inmates in a lawsuit would be moot.

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Todd Hatton

Todd Hatton hails from Paducah, Kentucky, where he got into radio under the auspices of the late, great John Stewart of WKYX while a student at Paducah Community College. He also worked at WKMS in the reel-to-reel tape days of the early 1990s before running off first to San Francisco, then Orlando in search of something to do when he grew up. He received his MFA in Creative Writing at Murray State University. He vigorously resists adulthood and watches his wife, Angela Hatton, save the world one plastic bottle at a time.

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