The execution of Thomas Eugene Creech, 73, one of the nation's longest-serving death row inmates was put on hold Wednesday, the latest in a number of botched lethal injections across the country (article available here).
For nearly an hour, Thomas Eugene Creech lay strapped to a table in an Idaho execution chamber as medical team members poked and prodded at his arms and legs, hands and feet, trying to find a vein through which they could end his life.
Lethal injection is the most common execution method in the United States, but officials have struggled to both find the drugs necessary and find suitable veins to inject them into.
Creech is one of several death row inmates who have had their executions halted in recent years after executioners had trouble placing an IV, a problem that has lingered since the country's first lethal injection was performed in 1982.
The medical team attempted to establish IV access eight times in multiple places and encountered issues with both accessing the veins and the quality of the veins, department director Josh Tewalt said at a news conference Wednesday.
In 2022, 35% of the 20 execution attempts were botched because of the incompetence of executioners, failure of protocol or flaws in the protocol design, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.
The execution team in Idaho included volunteers who were required to have at least three years of medical experience, according to the state's execution protocols. But their identities are unknown. They wore white balaclava-style face coverings and navy scrub caps to conceal themselves.
"This is what happens when unknown individuals with unknown training are assigned to carry out an execution," Federal Defender Services of Idaho said in a statement criticizing the attempted execution of Creech.
Though Idaho Gov. Brad Little signed a bill in March 2023 allowing execution by firing squad if that state can't obtain the drugs needed for lethal injection last year, in a statement, the Department of Correction says it is still in the process of trying to retrofit its execution chamber to accommodate a firing squad.
Creech was sentenced to death for killing a fellow inmate in 1981.