Did Idaho ‘botch’ Thomas Creech execution? How common are lethal injection issues?

An hour after Idaho Department of Correction officials had planned to execute a death row prisoner on Wednesday, the agency announced in a news release that 73-year-old Thomas Creech was still alive.

Officials said that after multiple attempts, they were unable to place IV lines to deliver lethal injection drugs to Creech, who is convicted of multiple murders and has spent nearly 50 years in prison.

It was the latest execution beset by complications, a trend that reached a peak in 2022, according to data from the nonprofit Death Penalty Information Center, which tracks death penalty data.

Creech’s legal team with the nonprofit Federal Defender Services of Idaho called the circumstances — which witnesses and officials said involved at least eight attempts to find a suitable vein — a “botched execution.” Department of Correction Director Josh Tewalt disputed that description at a news conference and said executioners halted the proceedings far before they constituted cruel and unusual punishment.

Did Idaho ‘botch’ Creech execution?

There’s no legal definition of a “botched” execution, but many researchers who study capital punishment define them as executions “involving unanticipated problems or delays that caused, at least arguably, unnecessary agony for the prisoner or that reflect gross incompetence of the executioner.”

Robert Dunham, former director of the Death Penalty Information Center, told the Idaho Statesman in a phone interview that it’s often a matter of semantics. By one definition, any execution that doesn’t go according to plan can be considered botched, Dunham said.

“Thomas Creech was supposed to be executed, and he wasn’t executed,” Dunham told the Statesman. “That’s a botched execution.”

Another interpretation implies negligence on the part of the executioners. Dunham pointed to examples in Alabama in recent years where executioners spent hours trying to place IV lines in condemned prisoners, sometimes resorting to cutting into the skin to find an IV site.

In contrast, Dunham said, the Idaho execution staff “handled their job with professionalism.”

“They didn’t then continue for an additional two hours to torture a death row prisoner by cutting into him and stabbing him in attempts to get access to any vein they possibly could,” Dunham said, referring to the Alabama incidents.

He said he understood Tewalt’s objection to calling the execution a “botched” attempt, as it could cast doubt on the department’s professionalism. Dunham praised Tewalt’s honesty following the execution attempt. Tewalt emphasized to reporters that “dignity, professionalism and respect” were top priorities.

“I don’t think that anyone would criticize the execution team for its decision to discontinue attempts to carry out the execution,” Dunham added.

In a statement, Idaho Gov. Brad Little called the decision to halt the execution “the right thing.”

IV placement causes execution issues elsewhere

Idaho, which last executed a prisoner in 2012, has not faced issues with IV placement during executions in the past. But the situation is not uncommon. The Death Penalty Information Center points to IV placement issues as a key factor in botched executions, which includes other canceled executions and successful procedures that met with problems.

The Death Penalty Information Center said 2022 — the most recent year for which data was available — had a record seven mishandled executions, two of which were halted. All appeared to be instances in which prison officials were unable to place IVs, sometimes after hours of attempts, according to the center.

Little in his statement addressed those instances.

“The team of professionals at IDOC was prepared for the possibility that medical professionals would not be able to access the inmate’s veins, a circumstance that has occurred in execution procedures elsewhere in the country,” the governor said.

Dunham told the Statesman that Idaho has joined Ohio and Alabama as states where execution attempts have been unsuccessful in recent decades. He called Wednesday’s outcome “predictable.”

According to Dunham, Creech’s age, any possible medical conditions and the decades of stress from sitting on death row could have contributed to difficulty in finding a suitable IV access point.

Execution team at IDOC

Tewalt and Little both emphasized that the execution staff was composed of “medical professionals,” but it’s not clear what qualifications the team had.

In a 2022 NPR interview, Dunham said executions are against all medical association guidelines and frequently are performed by people without a medical background.

“Lethal injection looks like a medical procedure, but it’s not a medical procedure,” Dunham told NPR.

IDOC officials keep the identities of execution staffers secret, though Tewalt told reporters “these are people who, in their day jobs, people’s lives depend on their ability to establish an IV.”

Multiple media witnesses at the execution — including Idaho Statesman opinion editor Scott McIntosh — said during the news conference that Creech did not appear to be in pain or discomfort.

Dunham said mounting issues with lethal injection in recent years have shown that it’s an “unreliable and inappropriate” means of execution.

“If we can’t reliably carry out executions, we probably shouldn’t be carrying them out at all,” Dunham said. “If a medical team is unable to carry out an execution, then that should tell us something about the execution method itself.”