Firms won’t sell execution drugs to Ariz.

PHOENIX — An Arizona prison official in charge of buying drugs to carry out the death penalty testified Tuesday in a media lawsuit over access to execution information that pharmaceutical companies will no longer sell drugs to carry out the punishment.

Carson McWilliams, a division director in charge of prison operations for the Arizona Department of Corrections, testified over whether the state must reveal its source of lethal-injection drugs and the qualifications of executioners.

Like other states, Arizona is struggling to obtain execution drugs after U.S. and European pharmaceutical companies began blocking the use of products for lethal injections.

McWilliams said it has gotten more difficult to find companies to sell drugs to Arizona, even though a law protects the firms from being publicly identified.