Texas Won’t Share Lethal Injection Drug With Other States

As the supply of a key drug used in lethal injections dwindles, state officials are knocking on the door of the busiest execution chamber in the country for help.

Some states that have the death penalty have asked Texas for doses of sodium thiopental, the so-called knockout drug, used as part of the three-drug cocktail in executions by lethal injection, accordingto Michelle Lyons, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. She would not identify the states that requested assistance.

The state has declined to make its supply available even though all of its 39 available doses are set to expire in March and there are only three executions scheduled in the state before then, Lyons said.

States ? including Arizona, Oklahoma, Ohio, Tennessee and Kentucky ? have scrambled to acquire the drug.

Read the full USA Today article here.