USA - Ohio. Judge Gregory Frost stayed the upcoming July 19 execution of Kenneth Smith because of "haphazard" lethal injection process

U.S. District Court Judge Gregory Frost stayed the upcoming July 19 execution of Kenneth Smith because of "haphazard" lethal injection process. Judge Frost said: “Ohio pays lip service to standards it then often ignores without valid reasons, sometimes with no physical ramifications and sometimes with what have been described as messy if not botched executions." Smith's attorneys argued that Ohio does not follow its own execution procedures, straying from the required number of execution team members and failing to document the mixing of drugs. According to the warden of the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility, executions in February and May involved only one medical team member, rather than the required two. Frost did not rule on the constitutionality of Ohio's death penalty statute, but held that Smith would likely prevail on a claim of unequal protection under the Fourteenth Amendment.