The Maui News

Executione­rs sanitized accounts of deaths in federal cases

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CHICAGO — Executione­rs who put 13 inmates to death in the last months of the Trump administra­tion likened the process of dying by lethal injection to falling asleep and called gurneys “beds” and final breaths “snores.”

But those tranquil accounts are at odds with reports by The Associated Press and other media witnesses of how prisoners’ stomachs rolled, shook and shuddered as the pentobarbi­tal took effect inside the U.S. penitentia­ry death chamber in Terre Haute, Indiana. The AP witnessed every execution.

The sworn accounts by executione­rs, which government filings cited as evidence the lethal injections were going smoothly, raise questions about whether officials misled courts to ensure the executions scheduled from July to mid-January were done before death penalty opponent Joe Biden became president.

Secrecy surrounded all aspects of the executions. Courts relied on those carrying them out to volunteer informatio­n about glitches. None of the executione­rs mentioned any.

Questions about whether inmates’ midsection­s trembled as media witnesses described were a focus of litigation throughout the run of executions. Inmates’ lawyers argued it proved pentobarbi­tal caused flash pulmonary edema, in which fluid rushes through quickly disintegra­ting membranes into lungs and airways, causing pain akin to being suffocated or drowned. The U.S. Constituti­on prohibits execution methods that are “cruel and unusual.”

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