10th Circuit Rejects Stay in Oklahoma Death Penalty Cases

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1oth Circuit rejected the requests for stays in four executions in Oklahoma, the Washington Post's Mark Berman reports. The executions are the first since Clayton Lockett's lethal injection was botched: "Lockett grimaced, clenched his jaw and writhed on the gurney before dying inside the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester on April 29. A state investigation released later found that the execution team failed to properly insert the needle to deliver the lethal injection drugs, a problem that was exacerbated when no one monitored the IV and compounded when no one involved knew what to do as the situation unfolded."

Oklahoma has a new protocol that the four death-penalty inmates are objecting to; they argue that the planned use of sedative midazolam would make them suffer a burning, intense pain as they are executed.