Opponents of the death penalty hold signs in front of the Supreme Court in Washington, DC (AFP Photo/Nicholas Kamm) |
Washington
(AFP) - The US state of Georgia temporarily halted executions Tuesday after the
drug used for lethal injections appeared faulty, authorities said.
The
decision came a day after Georgia delayed for the second time the execution of
Kelly Gissendaner, convicted of conspiring to murder her husband, when the
execution team found that the lethal pentobarbital dose appeared cloudy.
Gissendaner's
execution had already been delayed for several days because of wintry weather
in the southern state.
"Out of
an abundance of caution, the scheduled executions of Kelly Renee Gissendaner
and Brian Keith Terrell, have been postponed while an analysis is conducted of
the drugs planned for use in last night's scheduled execution of inmate
Gissendaner," Georgia Department of Corrections spokeswoman Gwendolyn
Hogan said.
"The
sentencing courts will issue new execution orders when the department is
prepared to proceed," she added in a statement.
Georgia
houses one of the country's biggest prison systems, supervising nearly 55,000
state prisoners and more than 160,000 people on probation.
Gissandaner
would have become the 16th female prisoner to be executed in the United States
since the death penalty was reinstated nationwide in 1976, compared with 1,387
men who have been put to death during that period, according to the Death
Penalty Information Center.
Georgia has
executed 57 prisoners since 1976, including two so far this year.
Prisoner
complaints from the southern state had led to the 1972 moratorium on the death
penalty, before it was re-established four years later.
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