US judge says he might block Nevada setting execution date
LAS VEGAS (AP) — A federal judge said Thursday he might issue an order to block a bid by prosecutors to have a state judge set a date as early as next month for Nevada’s first execution in 15 years.
U.S. District Judge Richard Boulware II told officials he'll need time to determine if the as-yet-undisclosed drugs and lethal injection process that prison officials want to use to put convicted mass murderer Zane Michael Floyd to death would be constitutionally humane.
The judge made no immediate decision and scheduled another court session Monday after hearing from a chief deputy Nevada attorney general, the state’s prisons chief, newly hired lawyers for Nevada’s top doctor and federal public defenders representing Floyd.
“This is a man who is going to be executed by the state,” Boulware said. “What could possibly be the state’s interest that would override that interest with respect to not disclosing the nature of the drugs under consideration?”
“Mr. Floyd has a constitutional right to know,” the judge added.
Prosecutors and prison officials are invoking the specter of a “media sideshow” and “cancel culture” in a bid to convince Boulware to let them keep secret the process for developing their plan to execute Floyd by lethal injection, the only capital punishment method that Nevada allows.
Randall Gilmer, a state attorney representing the Nevada Department of Corrections and prisons chief Charles Daniels, told the judge that until the state discloses the method and drugs to be used there is nothing for the judge to stop.
To date, Gilmer said, issues are in a “predecisional” stage and not subject for review by courts, defense attorneys or the public.
Nevada law lets prison officials withhold information about the execution protocol until several days before a scheduled...