DOJ reinstates execution methods

The Justice Department said Friday it is restoring lethal injection and adding firing squads to the federal execution protocol. (justice.gov) The April 24 announcement said the department is readopting the pentobarbital protocol used during President Donald Trump’s first term and changing internal procedures to speed death penalty cases. (justice.gov) Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said the department is seeking death sentences against 44 defendants and has authorized nine capital prosecutions, including cases tied to MS-13. (justice.gov) The department’s report also told the Bureau of Prisons to add other execution methods used by some states, including electrocution and gas asphyxiation, because lethal injection drugs can be hard to obtain. (usnews.com) (cnbc.com) That marks a sharp reversal from January 15, 2025, when Attorney General Merrick Garland withdrew the federal pentobarbital protocol after a Justice Department review found “significant uncertainty” about whether it caused unnecessary pain and suffering. (deathpenaltyinfo.org) The federal government had not previously included firing squad in its written protocols, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. Five states currently allow that method: Idaho, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Utah. (apnews.com) (deathpenaltyinfo.org) The practical effect may still be slow. Reuters reported it will likely take years before another federal execution can be scheduled because capital trials and appeals take years, and only three men remain on federal death row after Joe Biden commuted 37 sentences. (usnews.com) (corrections1.com) Those three are Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, convicted in the Boston Marathon bombing; Dylann Roof, convicted in the 2015 murder of nine Black parishioners at Mother Emanuel AME Church; and Robert Bowers, convicted in the Tree of Life synagogue massacre. (usnews.com) Trump restarted federal executions in 2020 after a 20-year gap, and 13 prisoners were put to death before he left office in January 2021, more federal executions than under any president in modern history. (usnews.com) (corrections1.com) Friday’s order restores the machinery for federal executions, but the next test will come in courtrooms and in the Justice Department’s pending capital cases, not at the death chamber. (justice.gov) (usnews.com)