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Nevada Cancels Planned Execution as Drug Maker Objects to Use of Its Drug

HeadlineJul 12, 2018

Nevada canceled a planned execution Wednesday, just hours before Scott Dozier was scheduled to die by lethal injection. The execution was halted after a pharmaceutical company successfully sued to prevent the use of its drug, midazolam, to be used as part of a three-drug lethal cocktail. During a court hearing Wednesday, Alvogen Pharmaceutical attorney Todd Bice said the sedative is not approved for use in executions, and said the Nevada Department of Corrections illegally obtained the drug.

Todd Bice: “The reputational and goodwill harm that is being proposed here is very serious for a business, particularly a pharmaceutical company whose entire mission and business purpose is to create and market and sell products that are designed to enhance and prolong people’s lives. And the use of those products to do the exact opposite, and then to have media coverage and their name associated with this, particularly when this drug, there is a risk of even what’s being characterized as botched executions, is highly harmful to any business.”

The condemned prisoner, Scott Dozier, has said he’d prefer to die than to remain on death row. He has attempted suicide in the past, and authorities have placed him on suicide watch after calling off Wednesday’s execution.

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