NAACP Denounces U.S. Supreme Court’s Decision on Lethal Injection

BALTIMORE, MD — Oklahoma and other states can continue to execute death-row prisoners with a three-drug combination that includes a chemical used in several botched lethal injections, a divided U.S. Supreme Court ruled today in a 5-4 vote. Subsequently, the NAACP has issued the following statement.

From Cornell William Brooks, NAACP President & CEO:

“The NAACP stands firmly and unequivocally against capital punishment, as well as the tools used to induce it. A lethal injection that caused a person to convulse between life and death for several minutes is, by any inhumane definition, cruel and unusual punishment. Lethal injection is no more than a cocktail of cruelty – antiquated morally and outdated constitutionally. We believe that the death penalty undermines trust and integrity in the criminal justice system, because it is racially biased, inhumane, and poses the grave risk that government actors will take the lives of innocent people. If wrongly prosecuted, an individual can be released from prison but not from a grave as demonstrated by the 330 people wrongly convicted and subsequently exonerated. Because the death penalty is applied in an arbitrary and inconsistent manner, it violates the prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment found in the U.S. Constitution. The goal of our Association is to abolish capital punishment in its entirety throughout the United States.”