Nevada’s top doctor due to testify in Vegas execution case
By KEN RITTER
Associated Press
LAS VEGAS (AP) — Nevada’s chief medical officer is expected to testify Thursday as hearings resume before a federal judge in Las Vegas who is considering whether the state’s lethal injection execution plan is constitutional. Attorneys for Dr. Ihsan Azzam have argued the state’s top doctor has not been involved in the research or writing of the execution procedure and that Nevada prisons chief Charles Daniels is the official responsible for carrying out what would be Nevada’s first execution in more than 15 years. Daniels is scheduled to testify Friday. Defense attorneys for Zane Floyd argue the state plan to use three or four drugs including the anesthetic ketamine and the synthetic opioid fentanyl would subject Floyd to an agonizingly cruel and inhumane death.