LETHAL-INJECTION DRUG UNDER ATTACK

WASHINGTON - The muscle-paralyzing drug used during lethal injections in Alabama is under attack by death penalty opponents in several states who argue the chemical cocktail is not as humane as once advertised.

The drug, which has the trade name Pavulon, is one of those "absolutely condemned" for use in animal euthanasia by the American Veterinary Medical Association.

About 30 states, including Alabama, use Pavulon as part of a three-drug recipe to execute condemned prisoners.

Death penalty opponents say that arguing against its use in the death chamber is even easier than their previous claims about the electric chair's ability to inflict cruel and unusual punishment.

"It's so bad that vets won't even use it to put animals to sleep. How on earth can you justify using it to kill people?" asked Michael Mello, a professor at Vermont Law School.

But nationally, prosecutors, prison officials and some judges have said the chemical combination causes a clean and clinical death. Any pain is eliminated because the inmate is first knocked unconscious, they say.

"While there is no guarantee that error will not occur," a panel of federal judges wrote in a recent California case, the defendant could not show "that he is subject to an unnecessary risk of unconstitutional pain or suffering."

The first drug through the IV, sodium pentothal, causes anesthesia.

Then the Pavulon, also known as pancuronium bromide, paralyzes the muscles. The third drug, potassium chloride, stops the heart.

Defense attorneys suggest that because sodium pentothal is a short-acting drug that induces - but does not maintain - its anesthetic effect, it could wear off too quickly. And the complete paralysis caused by the Pavulon could mask any reaction the inmate has to the pain of suffocation or cardiac arrest.

"This is so clearly wrong and so clearly barbaric," said Mello, a former public advocate for condemned prisoners in Florida.

There is a groundswell of legal cases tackling lethal injection as a violation of the Eighth Amendment protection against cruel and unusual punishment. None has reached the U.S. Supreme Court, so there has been no definitive decision on the method's constitutionality.

But opponents say they are making headway. A Tennessee judge last year said the method was allowable, but she was critical of the state's use of Pavulon. And a state appeals court in New Jersey is demanding corrections officials provide more medical evidence to back their claims that the injections are relatively painless.

"It's really extraordinary. It might seem as if this is going very slowly, but it's being done actually incredibly quickly," said Deborah Denno, a professor of law at Fordham University. "Even though there has been no big winning case, the fact that at least 12 to 15 courts are staying executions as a result of this, it's almost a mini-moratorium in and of itself."

`Legitimate fear':

Similar legal challenges to electrocution continued for years. But when state legislatures sensed the possibility that it could have been ruled unconstitutional, they pre-emptively changed their methods to lethal injection. Alabama switched in 2002.

Since then, four prisoners have been executed in Alabama.

First, the IV is started and the drugs are prepared by contracted medical personnel, not corrections officers. Two doses of sodium pentothal are given, the second as "insurance" that the anesthesia is definite and complete, said Department of Corrections spokesman Brian Corbett.

John Tinker, professor and chairman of the department of anesthesiology at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, said Alabama's two-dose total of sodium pentothal is plenty to keep the inmate unconscious for well over a half-hour. He also said it's critical to confirm that the inmate is unconscious before the Pavulon is given; the test can be as simple as if he doesn't open his eyes when ordered.

If the process moves too quickly and the inmate is somehow still awake when he gets the Pavulon, he can be aware and feel pain but unable to move even an eyelid. "That's a legitimate fear," Tinker said.

Execution postponed:

Eliminating Pavulon might not be an option, he said. It keeps the unconscious inmate's body from reacting on its own because the potassium chloride causes an intense burning in the veins. "His hand might move and the audience might think he's not asleep," Tinker said.

Alabama's protocol, which includes the intermittent flushing of the IV line with saline, is designed to take between seven and 10 minutes to complete.

The whole procedure could come under closer scrutiny after the U.S. Supreme Court decided last week to give Alabama prisoner David Larry Nelson another chance to fight it in court. Nelson, a three-time convicted murderer, claims the process for finding and accessing a vein could be unconstitutionally cruel for someone like him, an intravenous drug user with collapsed veins. His execution was postponed and none others have been scheduled since by the state.

Alabama Attorney General Troy King's office is following the Pavulon issue but "at this time we see no reason to be concerned," a spokesman said.