Citing a 2012 federal court order, the Alabama Department of Corrections on Thursday indicated that it would not divulge details about its execution procedures.

The Legislature this year is considering a proposal to make confidential the information about the drugs used during lethal injection, including the vendors selling those chemicals. Different versions have passed the House and Senate.

In a statement released Thursday, the department suggested that the court order mandates confidentiality far beyond the drugs involved in executions.

“As we have been reviewing inquiries related to executions in Alabama, I am under a legal obligation to comply with the Confidentiality Order entered in the case of Thomas D. Arthur v. Kim Thomas,” Commissioner Kim Thomas said in the statement. “This Confidentiality Order (Doc. 74) prevents public disclosure, and in fact deems ‘Confidential Information,’ a list of items related to executions, to include among other things the Department’s execution protocol and information contained in it, the identities of persons/entities currently or previously involved in executions, and ‘any documents, or information related to prior executions of any Alabama death row inmate.’”

The case pits Arthur, a death row inmate convicted in 1982 of the murder of a Muscle Shoals man, against the state over its use of one of the three drugs it uses in combination to execute condemned prisoners. The state had added pentobarbital to its three-drug cocktail, and Arthur argued that the change substantially altered procedure.

His execution has been delayed several times because of court challenges.

A status conference in the federal case has been scheduled for April 1.

“While the Department generally considers execution related documents confidential and exempt from public disclosure under Alabama law, because of the pending litigation, I will abide by the court order and will not release any execution information,” Thomas said in the statement.

The federal court is broader than the language in either of the two death penalty bills in the Legislature, but it applies only while Arthur’s challenge remains active.