URGENT ACTION

EXECUTIONS NOT RESUMED AFTER PRISONER FOUND DEAD
The State of Nevada was set to carry out its first execution in over 11 years. A prisoner who had waived his appeals was due to be executed on 14 November 2017. Amnesty International called for a moratorium on executions as a first step towards abolition. According to the Nevada Department of Corrections officials, the State of Nevada did not resume executions after the individual on death row was found dead in his cell of an “apparent suicide” on 5 January 2019. The individual’s execution had previously been stayed due to pending litigation initiated by a manufacturer of one of the drugs used in Nevada’s lethal injection protocol. Please halt all direct appeals to the Governor associated with this case.

NO FURTHER ACTION IS REQUESTED. MANY THANKS TO ALL WHO SENT APPEALS.

The execution of this prisoner in the state of Nevada would have been the first in the USA carried out using Fentanyl as part of the specific three-drug protocol chosen by the Nevada authorities. The individual had been on death row since 2007 for a murder committed in 2002. His execution was last scheduled to take place on 11 July 2018 but was halted just hours before the execution was to be carried out, after a district court judge issued a temporary restraining order preventing Nevada officials from using one of the drugs in its three-drug lethal injection protocol. Litigation initiated by a pharmaceutical company on the use of its products in the execution is ongoing.

The individual moved to waive his appeals in 2016, and the judge found him competent to do so in July 2017. The individual died in prison on 5 January 2019.

The US Supreme Court upheld new capital punishment laws in 1976 and the State of Nevada passed its current capital punishment law in 1977. The State of Nevada has carried out 12 executions since 1977 and the last execution was carried on 26 April 2006. There are currently 78 individuals on death row in the State of Nevada and there are no executions scheduled at this time.

NAME AND PREFFERED PRONOUN: He/him

THIS IS THE FOURTH AND FINAL UPDATE FOR UA 250/17

LINK TO PREVIOUS UA: https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/amr51/7400/2017/en/