South Carolina scheduled to execute Freddie Owens by lethal injection; how the drug works

Amid much-planned preparations and denied requests, Freddie Eugene Owens of Greenville, South Carolina is scheduled to face capital punishment on Friday via lethal injection. The decision came after the state Supreme Court on Sept. 12, refused a plea from Owens’ lawyers to postpone the execution. Despite the requests from civil rights leaders asking Gov. Henry McMaster to commute Owen’s sentence to life without the possibility of parole, McMaster claims he would announce his decision on the eve of the determined execution date.

Owens’ History and Selection of Execution Method

In South Carolina, it rests solely and entirely on the governor to grant clemency. Interestingly, since 1976, no South Carolina governor has extended this mercy to a death row prisoner. If clemency is not instituted, Owens will become the 44th death row inmate executed in South Carolina since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated capital punishment in 1976, and the first state-based prisoner executed since Jeffery Motts was put to death in May 2011 through lethal injection.

On Sept. 3, Owens’s attorney selected the method of execution on his behalf, as Owens personally declined to make the choice, citing his adherence to Islamic faith. Either the electric chair or firing squad could have been the alternatives. The upcoming execution is planned to take place at the Broad River Correctional Institution in Columbia.

The Crime and The Final Decision

In 1999, Owens was convicted for murder, armed robbery, alongside criminal conspiracy in the 1997 Halloween murder execution of Irene Graves, 41, in a Speedway convenience store. Confessing later, Owens also admitted to the ruthless killing of his cellmate, Christopher Bryan Lee.

The Drug for Execution

The South Carolina Department of Corrections has chosen to use a single medication, pentobarbital, to execute Owens and further inmates who opt for the lethal injection. The drug, a barbiturate, is known for treating conditions of tension, anxiety, nervousness, sleep difficulties, and is also used for anesthesia and euthanasia in animals.

According to Bryan Stirling, the director of the South Carolina Department of Corrections, the drug was tested by the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division to evade complications upon administration.

How does Pentobarbital Work?

As stated in the information by the National Library of Medicine, a specific dosage of pentobarbital can result in death within 15–30 minutes while leaving the individual in a coma-like condition. That is because the drug causes a slow-down in bloodstream, halts the central nervous system, and ultimately stops the heart. Should the pentobarbital be outdated, have an improper PH balance, or is not stored or administered correctly, it could lead to a “botched” execution, causing the inmate to undergo physical agony and a possible sense of drowning. Such a faulty execution could even lead to the inmate’s reawakening with serious organ damage. Notably, thirteen U.S. states have used pentobarbital for executions.

Reason Behind the Decades-Long Delay in Executions

South Carolina’s lethal injection drugs expired in 2013. Post this, companies ceased providing the state with such drugs as the supplier’s names became public information. This, combined with a mass outage, resulted in difficulty for South Carolina to obtain execution drugs. However, South Carolina General Assembly enacted legislation in 2023 to keep confidential the identities of the pharmaceutical companies and drug manufacturers that supply these drugs, thereby expediting the resumption of executions. A delay was also caused due to a lawsuit filed by death row inmates challenging the execution options (electrocution and firing squad) against the state’s constitution, which was ruled against in July by the state Supreme Court, deeming the options constitutional.