National Roundup

Iowa
Judge dismisses lawsuit over new judicial nominating law
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — A judge has dismissed a lawsuit challenging a new state law that changed the way some judges are selected in Iowa.

The lawsuit filed in May by a group of Democratic lawmakers and lawyers against Gov. Kim Reynolds was dismissed Thursday by a state court judge who said they don’t have legal standing to challenge the law.

The new law passed by Republicans and signed by Reynolds gave the governor an additional appointment to the 17-member state judicial nominating commission resulting in the governor having a majority of nine appointees. Lawyers continue to elect eight members to the group.

The lawsuit alleged that the vote of the lawyer members of the commission has been diluted and that the law is an unconstitutional overreach by the legislative branch of government into the judicial branch.

The commission nominates justices for the Iowa Supreme Court and the Iowa Court of Appeals.

Judge Sarah Crane, who was appointed to the court by Reynolds last year, dismissed the case.

Reynolds says the decision is good news for the rule of law and Iowans.

Attorneys for the plaintiffs say the decision will be appealed to the Iowa Supreme Court.

Alabama
Unsealed court filings center on dispute over midazolam
MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — Newly unsealed Supreme Court filings in an Alabama death penalty case show the continuing disagreement between inmate attorneys and the state over the effectiveness of the sedative midazolam in shielding prisoners from pain during lethal injections.

The portions of the court filings, which were previously blacked out, detail the views of medical experts testifying on behalf of death row inmate Christopher Lee Price, who was executed last month, and for the state of Alabama.

The arguments are similar to those made in previous court fights in Alabama and elsewhere over the use of the drug in executions.

The documents were made public in their entirety after justices on Monday granted a request from NPR and the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press to make the court filings public without having portions blacked out.

Price had unsuccessfully sought a stay from the high court as he argued that the state’s lethal injection process in unconstitutionally painful.

Price was executed last month after justices said the execution could proceed.

A lawyer for Price wrote that their three experts, including two anesthesiologists and a surgical pathologist, say inmates will experience “excruciating pain” and the drug would cause the inmate’s lungs to fill with fluid.
Alabama disputed those claims and said their expert, a pharmacist with a doctorate degree, said the state uses a dose higher than what a doctor would use in a medical setting.

Inmates challenging their method of execution must suggest an alternative means for carrying out their death sentence. Price asked to be put to death by breathing pure nitrogen gas, a method the state has authorized but not yet used.

John Palombi, an attorney with the Federal Defenders Program who represents multiple death row inmates, said the unsealed portions of Price’s court filing include a footnote indicating the “state’s expert agreed that death by nitrogen hypoxia, if done properly, would be pain free.”

Palombi wrote in an email that,” Despite this, the state chose to execute (inmates) by a method that has been found to cause an unconstitutional level of pain.”

Alabama has maintained the lethal injection procedure is constitutional and courts have upheld its use.

Alabama did not oppose the request to unseal the court documents, according a court filing, since a federal appellate court recently ruled in another case that Alabama can’t keep its lethal injection procedures a state secret.

Lawyers for the state told justices the prison system maintains security concerns over the release of some execution procedures, but “accepts that its protocol likely will be disclosed.”

The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in March sided with The Associated Press and other news outlets seeking Alabama’s lethal injection protocol and other records related to an aborted 2018 execution.

That case is now back before a federal judge.

Oklahoma
Court reinstates death penalty for man in slaying
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — A federal appeals court has reinstated the death sentence of an Oklahoma man convicted in the fatal shooting of his lover’s estranged husband.

The full 10th Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday voted 10-3 to overturn a three-judge panel’s 2-1 ruling in 2017 that overturned the death sentence of 66-year-old James Pavatt on the grounds that the state failed to prove the November 2001 shooting death of Rob Andrew was “especially heinous, atrocious or cruel.”

Pavatt’s attorneys declined comment.

Pavatt and Brenda Andrew were both convicted and sentenced to death after being arrested in February 2002 while crossing back into the United States from Mexico, where they had fled with the Andrew’s two children following the shooting.

Florida
Man gets life sentence for killing 2 men over drug debt
OCALA, Fla. (AP) — A confessed hit man for a Mexican drug cartel has been sentenced to life in prison in Florida for killing two men over a drug debt.

The Ocala Star-Banner reports that Marion County jurors decided to spare the life Thursday of 57-year-old Jose Manuel Martinez. He was convicted earlier this month of first-degree murder. The death penalty would have required a unanimous decision from the jury.

Authorities say Martinez fatally shot 20-year-old Javier Huerta and 28-year-old Gustavo Olivares in November 2006 because of a debt over 10 kilograms of cocaine. Their bodies were found in a pickup truck near the Ocala National Forest.

Martinez’s DNA was found on a cigarette in the truck. He was arrested in 2013 at the Arizona-Mexico border.

Martinez told investigators that he’s killed more than 30 people. He’s been convicted of 10 killings and one attempted murder.