An execution in the US was aborted last week after the inmate was left with 10 puncture wounds when medical personnel were unable to find a vein after two and a half hours of trying. The failed attempts left behind a bloodied death chamber, the inmate’s lawyer said.



On Thursday, Alabama tried to execute by lethal injection convicted murderer Doyle Hamm, 61, who has spent more than half his life on death row. After about two and a half hours of trying, the state called the execution off because issues with Hamm’s veins could not be resolved before a death warrant expired at midnight.

“It was a gory, botched execution. They gave up when they could not find a vein,” Bernard Harcourt, a professor at the Columbia University law school who is representing Hamm, said by email on Sunday.

The execution has come under federal court review, with a US district judge calling for the state to preserve evidence, including the clothes Hamm was wearing.

Alabama corrections department officials were not immediately available to respond to Harcourt’s comments.

States including Oklahoma and Arizona have also conducted botched executions that raised questions about death chamber protocols in the 31 US states with the capital punishment.

“I wouldn’t necessarily characterize what we had tonight as a problem,” Jeff Dunn, Alabama correction department’s commissioner, told reporters shortly after the execution was called off.

There were two sets of medical personnel who tried to place a line in Hamm’s groin area or in an area between his knees and feet, Harcourt said, adding the inmate, who was examined by a doctor after the execution attempt, had at least 12 puncture wounds.

In court filings in the days before the planned execution, Hamm’s lawyers said he had terminal cancer and a history of intravenous drug use that had severely compromised his veins.

They said Alabama was rushing through a specialized execution protocol, increasing the chances of a flawed procedure.

The state responded at the time it knew what it was doing and could handle the lethal injection. It has not indicated if it will seek a new execution date.

The plan called for the insertion of intravenous catheters into Hamm’s leg or central vein, legal papers showed.

“Our case was that this would be torturous and bloody and they wouldn’t succeed,” Harcourt said.