Court's ruling highlights death penalty issue
(Tribune illustration)

While the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the legality of a drug used in lethal injections, the pace of executions in Indiana has slowed.

Indiana, one of 31 states with the death penalty, has not executed an inmate since 2009. Indiana law calls for the death sentence only in murder cases that involve rape, robbery, arson or if the victim was a law enforcement officer or a child.


Thirteen men are on death row in the Indiana State Prison in Michigan City, including Kevin C. Isom, who killed his wife, Cassindra, 40, and her children, Michael Moore, 16, and Ci'Andria Cole, 13, in 2007 in Gary. None of the 13 has an execution date.

Debra Denise Brown also faces the death penalty for the 1984 strangling of Tamika Turks, 7, in Gary. She's being held in Ohio on a separate murder conviction.

Capital punishment hasn't been an issue in recent Hoosier statewide elections, and pharmaceutical companies that the make the drugs states rely on to execute inmates are refusing to sell them. In addition, the cost of death penalty trials troubles fiscal conservatives in death penalty states.

In a 5-4 opinion Monday, the Supreme Court ruled the sedative midazolom used in Oklahoma's lethal injection protocol, did not violate the Eighth Amendment's ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

The Supreme Court ruling also served as an indication of how strongly divided the justices are on the death penalty. Four judges read their opinions from the bench, underscoring the chasm between conservatives and liberals regarding capital punishment.

Two justices called for a review of the constitutionality of the death penalty as it pertains to the Eighth Amendment.

"I believe it highly likely that the death penalty violates the Eighth Amendment," Justice Stephen Breyer wrote. "At the very least, the court should call for full briefing on the basic question." Breyer said studies show the death penalty isn't a deterrent to violence.

Justice Samuel Alito wrote the majority decision.

"While most humans wish to die a painless death, many do not have that good fortune," he wrote. "Holding that the Eighth Amendment demands the elimination of essentially all risk of pain would effectively outlaw the death penalty altogether."

Valparaiso University School of Law Dean Andrea Lyon, who's tried 138 murder cases and won all 19 death penalty cases as a defense attorney, thinks the death penalty will disappear within 10 years.

"States have been getting rid of the death penalty. It's the fewest number now since our nation started it," she said referring to Nebraska, which abolished its death penalty in May.

Lyon said the majority of Americans are opposed to the death penalty and favor life without parole.

Last year, an Indiana Department of Correction spokesman said the state plans to use Brevital, a barbiturate in the same class as thiopental sodium, as part of its three-drug protocol. Thiopental sodium is no longer being sold to states for executions.


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