Doctors' role in executions debated
stewart...@netzero.com
> Death penalty foes go after licenses.
>
> By CARLOS CAMPOS
>The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
> Published on: 02/01/05
After a lethal dose of chemicals flowed through the veins of convicted
killer Timothy Don Carr last Tuesday night, two physicians with
stethoscopes around their necks quietly entered the execution chamber.
One at a time, the doctors confirmed with a somber nod to the warden of
the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison in Jackson that the
state had succeeded in carrying out the court-ordered death penalty. A
third physician, unseen behind a two-way mirror, monitored an
electrocardiogram that displayed the prisoner's last heartbeats.
The doctors' identities are carefully protected - as are all involved
in lethal injections, including prison officials who activate the
plungers that deliver the deadly dose. The contract providing for the
doctors' services at an execution forbids the Department of Corrections
from disclosing their names.
The doctors have a reason for wanting anonymity: Their medical licenses
are under attack from death penalty opponents.
Activists say doctors who participate in executions violate the
Hippocratic oath and the American Medical Association's Code of Medical
Ethics. Dr. Arthur Zitrin of New York, who calls himself a death
penalty "abolitionist," has begun challenging physicians who
participate in executions.
In October, Zitrin, two other doctors and a sociology professor lodged
acomplaint with the Georgia medical board against Dr. Hothur V.
Sanjeeva Rao, a physician whotestified in a Gwinnett County trialthat
he had assisted with executions.
"I think it's a totally improper role for a physician to be complicit
with the state in killing people, because it's not the role of a doctor
to do that," said Zitrin, a professor emeritus of psychiatry at the New
York University School of Medicine. "The role of a doctor is to heal
and to preserve life, whenever there is a possibility of doing so."
Rao quit working executions in Juneafter he learned that Zitrin planned
to lodge a complaint against him.The challenge was dismissed in
December by the state medical board.
The Georgia Department of Corrections is lobbying for legislation that
would prohibit the challenge of physicians' licenses for participating
in executions.
Cost to state rises
Corrections officials say they don't want to get involved in the debate
over the death penalty. But it is the agency's responsibility to carry
out orders of the court, and state law requires two physicians in
attendance at executions "to determine when death supervenes."
Prison officials say the challenge to Rao's medical license
dramatically drove up the cost of hiring doctors to attend executions.
The prison system now pays Rainbow Medical Associates $18,000 per
execution. Before Rao's license was challenged, the department paid
$850 per execution, said Bill Amideo, a lawyer for the state agency.
The cost jumped because the doctors had to purchase liability insurance
to protect themselves from possible license challenges, Amideo said.
While he expected the prison system would have to pay more for the
doctor's services, perhaps as much as $6,000 per execution, "we ended
up having to pay three times as much to get this contract," Amideo
said.
State officials were in a hurry to sign Rainbow on June 29, just two
days before the scheduled execution of convicted murderer Robert Karl
Hicks on July 1. Since Rainbow Medical Associates has had the contract,
its doctors have presided over three executions.
Georgia has executed 14 people by lethal injection since the electric
chair was ruled unconstitutional in 2001.
"What they try to do is get publicity and embarrass physicians," Amideo
said, making it difficult for the prison system to find doctors who
will work executions.
Lawyers who represent prisoners facing the death penalty have been
supportive of the effort, including some in Georgia who have argued in
court that lethal injection is cruel and unusual punishment.
Dr. Carlo Musso, who signed the contract with the state on behalf of
Rainbow Medical Associates, said the group of seven to 10 doctors
provides medical services to county jails throughout Georgia and is
available to monitor executions.
Musso said he and other doctors in the group are "a little bit worried"
about license challenges, but he feels strongly they are providing an
important service.
Musso said in an interview that he was one of the doctors who oversaw
Carr's execution Jan. 25.
"If an execution is going to be carried out, it's going to be carried
out," Musso said. "Our role is to make sure it is to be performed with
the least amount of pain and suffering as possible. That's my duty."
The physician said he personally does not approve of the death penalty
except "in the most egregious circumstances." But if doctors do not
participate in lethal injections, he said, courts could return to more
"archaic" methods of execution.
"If health care professionals were not involved in the process, then
there very well may be undue suffering to inmates that occurs during
execution, and I think that's a greater concern," Musso said.
Musso, who is also medical director of the Rainbow House, an emergency
shelter for abused children in Clayton County, said the doctors have
donated some of the money they earn from executions.
Musso is a member of the American Medical Association, a 250,000-member
organization that represents the interests of doctors nationwide. The
AMA has issued an ethical opinion that a physician "should not be a
participant in a legally authorized execution."
The opinion goes on to define physician participation in executions as
including monitoring vital signs and electrocardiograms and attending
or observing an execution as a physician.
The Medical Association of Georgia, with 7,000 members, has adopted the
AMA guidelines. But neither group has the power to sanction physicians
beyond revoking their membership in the association.
In November, Zitrin and other doctors questioned whether Gov. Ernie
Fletcher of Kentucky - also a physician - had jeopardized his
medical license by signing a death warrant for a convicted killer. In
January, the Kentucky Board of Medical Licensure ruled Fletcher was
acting as governor, not as a physician.
'An obvious tension'
Dr. Michael Goldrich, chairman of the AMA's Council on Ethical and
Judicial Affairs, said physicians should play no role in executions.
"There's an obvious tension between the state's requirements and the
profession's roles," Goldrich said. "Just because the state says that
physicians have to be present for there to be an execution, physicians
are under ethical obligation that may be in conflict with the state's
desires or needs."
David Cook, executive director of the Medical Association of Georgia,
said the group has not taken a formal position on a bill filed last
month by State Rep. Alan Powell (D-Hartwell) to block challenges to
doctors' licenses for participation in an execution. But Cook said the
association believes the state medical board should be able to
determine on its own whether license challenges have merit.
Rao's testimony at a Gwinnett County trial that drew the attention of
Zitrin and death penalty lawyers involved the execution of convicted
murderer Jose Martinez High in 2001.
Medical technicians spent 39 minutes trying to find a suitable vein
through which the lethal injection could be delivered.
Rao testified he eventually stepped in and inserted a catheter into a
vein between High's neck and shoulder, allowing the execution to
proceed.
Zitrin's complaint said Rao's conduct "violates established national
medical ethics" and asked the state board to "impose appropriate
sanctions should the board confirm these serious ethical violations."
LaSharn Hughes, executive director of the Composite State Board of
Medical Examiners, declined to comment specifically on the case or on
physician participation in executions, except to say that "it's not a
burning issue with the board at this time."
A Dec. 15 letter sent to Zitrin from Hughes said that "after careful
consideration, the board has determined that there was no violation of
the Georgia Medical Practice Act and has consequently determined to
close this matter." The letter went on to note that physician
attendance at executions is required by Georgia law.
Rao did not return a telephone call seeking comment, but said in an
October interview with American Medical News that he merely monitored
lethal injections.
"There was just too much harassment, and I didn't want to be involved
in these things," Rao told the medical newspaper. "I don't have any
problems with prisoners who have killed people and don't have any
regrets receiving the death sentence, but I don't want to be involved."
Powell said doctors should not be punished for helping the Department
of Corrections carry out sentences "set forth by a judge and jury."
"Nobody wants to be involved in a public execution, but that's the
law," he said. "But he's not injecting the drugs. The Department of
Corrections actually does the injection."
Find this article at:
http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/0205/01deathdoctors.html
Drive around McClean, VA(the home of CIA headquarters) and read the
road signs: "George Bush's CIA"
Nixon is spinning in his grave wondering what Bush has to do to be
impeached.
"Fascism should rightly be called Corporatism, as it is a merge of
State and Corporate power." ---Benito Mussolini, the father of modern
fascism.
Docky Wocky
their gurney hooked-up to the injection plumbing for week or so?
If they start to smell bad after a couple of days, the state can be pretty
sure they are dead, check the block on the form, and save that $18,000 per
execution rip-off.
MrPepper11
> Doctors' role in executions debated
> > Death penalty foes go after licenses.
> > By CARLOS CAMPOS
> > The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
> > Published on: 02/01/05
> After a lethal dose of chemicals flowed through the veins of
convicted
> killer Timothy Don Carr last Tuesday night, two physicians with
> stethoscopes around their necks quietly entered the execution
chamber.
>
> One at a time, the doctors confirmed with a somber nod to the warden
of
> the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison in Jackson that the
> state had succeeded in carrying out the court-ordered death penalty.
A
> third physician, unseen behind a two-way mirror, monitored an
>
> The prison system now pays Rainbow Medical Associates $18,000 per
> execution.
David Moffitt
"Docky Wocky" <mrc...@lst.net> wrote in message
news:HYQLd.36$uc.24@trnddc04...
%%%% Why not just tie them down on the gurney and slit their throat and save
the money on the injection and the doctor then dispose of the carcass in the
hog pen on the prison farm as feed. When the hogs quit feeding check the
dead box on the form.
>
>
David Moffitt
<stewart...@netzero.com> wrote in message
news:1107285472.5...@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
> Doctors' role in executions debated
> > Death penalty foes go after licenses.
%%%% Why do they wipe the arm with an alcohol pad before starting the
injection? Are they afraid they are going to give him an infection that will
kill him? :o)
Egbert Sousč
Why did those old Mexicans give the guy, who was about to be shot, a
cigarette? Were they trying to give him cancer?
Panco Villa had a great way to execute guys. Place four guys one
behind the other closely. One shot does the job. Maybe there was a
shortage of ammunition.
David Moffitt
"Egbert Sousč" <egber...@WCF.com> wrote in message
news:gr50011ejn073s07l...@4ax.com...
> On Tue, 01 Feb 2005 22:57:31 GMT, "David Moffitt"
> <moff...@prodigy.net> wrote:
>
> >
> ><stewart...@netzero.com> wrote in message
> >news:1107285472.5...@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
> >> Doctors' role in executions debated
> >> > Death penalty foes go after licenses.
> >
> >%%%% Why do they wipe the arm with an alcohol pad before starting the
> >injection? Are they afraid they are going to give him an infection that
will
> >kill him? :o)
> >
> >
> Why did those old Mexicans give the guy, who was about to be shot, a
> cigarette? Were they trying to give him cancer?
%%%% You can get a little enjoyment from a cigarette. You cannot from a
alcohol pad.
> Panco Villa had a great way to execute guys. Place four guys one
> behind the other closely. One shot does the job. Maybe there was a
> shortage of ammunition.
%%%% Efficiency. Apache indians would wrap your skull with wet stretched raw
hide and stake you out in the sun. When the hide shrank your skull popped
like a watermelon. :o)