The Supreme Court upheld Kentucky's use of lethal injection executions today.

The Supreme Court upheld Kentucky's use of lethal injection executions today. The justices, by a 7-2 vote, turned back a constitutional challenge to the procedures in place in Kentucky, which uses 3 drugs to sedate, paralyze and kill inmates. "We ... agree that petitioners have not carried their burden of showing that the risk of pain from maladministration of a concededly humane lethal injection protocol, and the failure to adopt untried and untested alternatives, constitute cruel and unusual punishment," Chief Justice John Roberts said in an opinion that garnered only 3 votes. Four other justices, however, agreed with the outcome. Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and David Souter dissented. Executions have been on hold since September, when the court agreed to hear the Kentucky case. There was no immediate indication when they would resume. The case before the court came from Kentucky, where 2 death row inmates did not ask to be spared execution or death by injection. Instead, they wanted the court to order a switch to a single drug, a barbiturate, that causes no pain and can be given in a large enough dose to cause death. At the very least, they said, the state should be required to impose tighter controls on the three-drug process to ensure that the anesthetic is given properly.