Texas Executes Man Using Expired Drugs

Texas used lethal injection to execute 65-year-old Robert Fratta on Tuesday night despite an ongoing legal fight over the state’s use of allegedly expired drugs.

Fratta, a former Houston cop convicted of hiring two people to kill his wife in 1994 amid a custody battle, was pronounced dead Tuesday night just before 8 p.m. after a lethal injection of pentobarbital.

For a short time on Tuesday afternoon, Fratta’s fate hung in the balance because of an injunction ordered by Judge Catherine A. Mauzy of the 345th District Court of Travis County in response to a lawsuit by Fratta and three other death row inmates. These prisoners have been fighting what they claim is the use of expired pentobarbital for executions. According to their lawsuit, the pentobarbital stocks Texas is using expired years ago, and they claim the drugs will “act unpredictably, obstruct IV lines during the execution, and cause unnecessary pain.” The plaintiffs also argued that using these expired drugs violates several Texas laws. They weren’t asking the court to spare their lives, they insisted, but that the court forbid Texas from using expired drugs.

The state of Texas objected to this characterization, claiming it retests the doses to make sure they’re still potent and then relabels the pentobarbital with a new expiration date. The state also argues that the restrictions on the use of pharmaceutical drugs don’t apply to executions because the drugs aren’t being used for treatment but to kill. Attorney General Ken Paxton turned to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals to attempt to stop civil judges of district courts (where this lawsuit was being heard) from attempting to interfere with any upco