“Nothing you say or read to me am I going to believe, frankly, until I see with my own eyes the context, okay?”
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On Wednesday, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor accused the state of Oklahoma of lying numerous times in their briefs about the drugs they use to execute death-row inmates.
At issue in the case is whether midazolam, the drug of choice for Oklahoma and several other states, is capable of anesthetizing inmates before they are given painful and lethal drugs. Experts say Oklahoma's third drug, for example, feels like liquid fire.
"I am substantially disturbed that in your brief you made factual statements that were not supported by those sources [you cited, and were] in fact directly contradicted," Sotomayor told Oklahoma Solicitor General Patrick Wyrick. "So nothing you say or read to me am I going to believe, frankly, until I see with my own eyes the context, okay?"
Sotomayor said she found "many" examples of Oklahoma playing fast and loose with the facts, but said she would list out three. (She actually only listed two examples before the arguments shifted to another topic.)
The problem: Pharmacology experts say midazolam is not capable of general anesthesia. Oklahoma quotes the drug's label as saying midazolam's "[a]nticipated effects range from mild sedation to deep levels of sedation virtually equivalent to a state of general anesthesia where the patient may require external support of vital functions."
That quotation is on the label; the issue, as Sotomayor pointed out, is what comes before it. The quotation is actually in a section that's talking about what would happen when midazolam is paired with other drugs:
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