There's no timetable yet for Georgia to resume executions, but Gov. Nathan Deal said efforts to clean up Georgia's death penalty drugs could soon be completed.
He's referring to the state's decision to indefinitely postpone lethal injections after the chemicals that were to be used to execute Kelly Gissendaner for the 1997 murder of her husband were deemed to be "cloudy."
The governor said Tuesday that prisons officials have taken "extreme efforts" to make sure the drugs work properly.
"I am told they believe they are now on track to have a reliable source, one that will prevent the clouding of the drug, or any contamination or crystallization of the drug, which has also been a problem in the past," he said. "That's my only concern about it. That needs to be resolved, and hopefully they've found a way to do that."
Gissendaner's attorneys contend the starts-and-stops that have led to repeated delays in her execution amount to "cruel and unusual punishment." Her case has also sparked a broader debate about a 2013 law that classifies Georgia's lethal injection protocol as "confidential state secrets."
Death penalty critics have sought a reversal of the law, contending that the public deserves the right to know how executions are carried out. But Deal, who signed the proposal into law, cast it as an essential protection for the drugmakers supplying the chemicals and the doctors and nurses involved in the executions.
"If I had the confidence that their would not be major groups boycotting these individuals and trying to do undue pressure on them, I would have not problem with that," he said. "But we know that's not the case. The reason we have the secrecy is to protect these individuals or companies who are, in effect, doing what the state has requested them to do."
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