[JURIST] Oklahoma on Wednesday requested that the US District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma [official website] dismiss a lawsuit filed after the botched execution of Clayton Lockett. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), The Guardian and The Oklahoma Observer [websites] filed the lawsuit in August [JURIST report] in reaction to the state’s decision to draw a curtain midway through the execution, blocking witnesses from seeing what was happening in the death chamber. The complaint argues that bearing witness to executions is a right granted by the First Amendment of the US Constitution and the state’s decision to block access to the execution violated that right. Oklahoma assistant attorney general M Daniel Weitman filed a motion for dismissal [text, PDF] of the lawsuit on the grounds that “[t]he general lack of utility of the salacious details of an execution shows that press presence does not play a particularly positive role worthy of a First Amendment right of special access.” Prison officials closed the curtains to the execution room 27 minutes into Lockett’s execution. Lockett’s execution took approximately 43 minutes and witness accounts state the prisoner showed signs of intense pain.

The controversy surrounding the contents of lethal injection drugs and execution protocol in the US has been a mainstream issue in politics and in courts around the US in 2014. Earlier this month Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin announced [JURIST report] a series of new protocols that are expected to take effect for state executions. In May the Oklahoma Criminal Court of Appeals approved [JURIST report] a six-month stay of the execution for a current death row inmate while an investigation is conducted into issues with Lockett’s execution. In a June article JURIST Guest Columnist Andrew Spiropoulos of the Oklahoma City University School of Law discussed [JURIST op-ed] the tactical strategies of all parties involved in the Oklahoma Courts’ death penalty decisions. Also in June JURIST Guest Columnist Kimberly Newberry clarified the current policy [JURIST op-ed] surrounding lethal injection law in Oklahoma and explored the repercussions of such a policy.