Texas gets new batch of execution drug after supply ran short

By Jon Herskovitz AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) - Texas has received a new stock of a lethal injection drug after its supply of the sedative it uses in executions fell to just one batch, prison officials said on Wednesday. "The Texas Department of Criminal Justice has obtained a new supply of pentobarbital, which will allow the agency to carry out executions that are scheduled for the month of April," spokesman Jason Clark said in a statement. Texas, which has accounted for 37 percent of all executions in the United States since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976, has four executions planned for April. Earlier this month, the state had two batches left of pentobarbital. It used one of those for an execution on March 11. The state obtained a fresh supply from a compounding pharmacy, whose name was not disclosed, Clark said. "We continue to explore all options including the continued used of pentobarbital or alternate drugs to use in the lethal injection process," he said. Texas and several other states have had to search for new drugs for their lethal injection cocktails after many pharmaceutical companies, mostly in Europe, imposed sales bans about four years ago because they objected to having medications that were made for other purposes used in lethal injections. Several states including Texas have turned to lightly regulated compounding pharmacies, which can mix chemicals for use as pharmaceuticals, to make their lethal injection compounds. Lawyers for death row inmates have said that could lead to impure mixtures that could cause undue suffering and violate U.S. constitutional protections against cruel and unusual punishment. (Reporting by Jon Herskovitz; Editing by Peter Cooney)