A Nevada judge has effectively put the execution of a two-time killer on hold after a pharmaceutical company objected to the use of one of its drugs to put someone to death.



Judge Elizabeth Gonzalez of Clark county district disallowed the use of the sedative in a ruling that came down less than nine hours before twice-convicted killer Scott Raymond Dozier, 47, was to be executed with an untested combination of drugs including the opioid fentanyl.

His lawyer, Thomas Ericsson, called Wednesday “a roller-coaster” for Dozier, his family and two close friends who were meeting for what they believed to be the last time at a prison in the remote northeastern city of Ely when they were notified that Dozier’s execution was off.



Dozier, whose execution also was postponed in November amid concerns about the drugs being used and who has attempted suicide in the past, was disappointed, Ericsson said. Dozier, 47, has said he wants to die rather than spend his life in prison.

“He was obviously prepared to be executed tonight,” Ericsson said. “He found out right about six hours before that it was postponed again.”

The delay came after Nevada announced it would substitute the sedative midazolam for expired prison stocks of diazepam, commonly known as Valium. Its manufacturer, Alvogen of New Jersey, filed a lawsuit accusing Nevada of illegally securing the drug for unapproved purposes.

Pharmaceutical companies have resisted the use of their drugs in executions for 10 years, citing legal and ethical concerns. But the legal challenge filed by Alvogen is only the second of its kind in the US, said Robert Dunham, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center.

Alvogen cited public criticism of “botched” executions in states when midazolam had been used.

Death-penalty watchers have pointed to inconsistent results with midazolam since the 2014 executions of Dennis McGuire in Ohio and Josph Rudolph Wood III in Arizona. It has also been used in Alabama, Arkansas and Florida. McGuire and Wood were observed gasping and snorting before they died. Wood’s execution took nearly two hours.

A second pharmaceutical company, Sandoz, also raised objections at Wednesday’s hearing to the use of one of its drugs — the muscle-paralysing substance cisatracurium — in executing Dozier. The company did not immediately ask to join Alvogen’s lawsuit.

Dozier told a judge that he doesn’t really care if he suffers when he dies. But he allowed lawyers last year to challenge the three-drug method that Nevada planned to use, including the sedative diazepam, the potent opioid fentanyl and a muscle paralyzing drug called cisatracuriam. None had ever been used in an execution before.



Dozier was sentenced to death in 2007 for robbing, killing and dismembering 22-year-old Jeremiah Miller at a Las Vegas motel in 2002. Miller had come to Nevada to buy ingredients to make meth. His decapitated torso was found in a suitcase.



In 2005, Dozier was sentenced to 22 years in prison for shooting to death another drug-trade associate, 26-year-old Jasen Greene, whose body was found in 2002 in a shallow grave outside Phoenix.

