Federal Suit Seeks to Block Ala. Execution

Price

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) – Attorneys for an Alabama death row inmate have filed a federal lawsuit arguing that the state’s new lethal injection drug combination has never been tried on any prisoner in the United States and amounts to cruel and unusual punishment.

Attorneys for Christopher Lee Price filed the suit Wednesday night. It asks a federal judge to block the state from using the new, three-drug combination. The state prison system developed the combination after running out of one of the drugs in its old execution protocol.

Price was sentenced to death for the killing and robbery of Fayette County minister Bill Lynn in 1991.

Another death row inmate, Tommy Arthur, filed papers with the Alabama Supreme Court last week objecting to the new drug combination.