Doctors, Lethal Injection, and Firing Squads

I. Glenn Cohen Bioethics, Doctor-Patient Relationship, End-of-Life, I. Glenn Cohen, Professional Regulation

Yesterday JAMA published a new perspective I co-wrote with Bob Truog and Mark Rockoff  “Physicians, Medical Ethics, and Execution by Lethal Injection“. In that article we make the case that the recommendations coming out of the Oklahoma botched lethal injection executions to require physician involvement would force physicians into an untenable medical ethical position. We also argue that it supports a kind of kabuki theater of medicalization, where execution becomes normalized.

Now comes a news report of a Utah lawmaker pushing to give those set to be executed the option of firing squad which he views as more humane than lethal injection. Many people will no doubt recoil at this notion. But here is my intentionally provocative question (and this is on my behalf not my co-authors): If you are in favor of capital punishment, wouldn’t a single close range shot to the head as a form of execution be, in some ways, more defensible than lethal injection? If you recoil at the notion of this being a way of doing execution, have you perhaps fallen for the kabuki theater of medicalization? Why not choose a method of execution that is more honest about the gravity (and perhaps the horror) of what we are doing rather than present something as somewhere on a continuum with sedation?

I. Glenn Cohen

I. Glenn Cohen is the James A. Attwood and Leslie Williams Professor of Law at Harvard Law School and current Faculty Director of the Petrie-Flom Center. A member of the inaugural cohort of Petrie-Flom Academic Fellows, Glenn was appointed to the Harvard Law School faculty in 2008. Glenn is one of the world's leading experts on the intersection of bioethics (sometimes also called "medical ethics") and the law, as well as health law. He also teaches civil procedure. From Seoul to Krakow to Vancouver, Glenn has spoken at legal, medical, and industry conferences around the world and his work has appeared in or been covered on PBS, NPR, ABC, CNN, MSNBC, Mother Jones, the New York Times, the New Republic, the Boston Globe, and several other media venues. He was the youngest professor on the faculty at Harvard Law School (tenured or untenured) both when he joined the faculty in 2008 (at age 29) and when he was tenured as a full professor in 2013 (at age 34).

3 thoughts to “Doctors, Lethal Injection, and Firing Squads”

  1. You also might be opposed to capital punishment and still prefer the close range shot as the least bad option. Or what about sedation followed by the shot?

  2. You also might be opposed to capital punishment and still prefer the close range shot as the least bad option. Or what about sedation followed by the shot?

  3. Very provocative thoughts. The continuum notion is particularly striking, and makes me wonder whether attitudes on the ethicality of lethal injection relative to other methods of execution might hinge on deeper philosophical commitments, implicit or explicit, regarding the telos of punishment in general.

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