Kentucky is the latest state to switch to a single-drug execution method for inmates on death row.The state previously used the a three-drug cocktail in lethal executions. But Franklin Circuit Judge Phillip Shepherd ordered the state to rethink that process to avoid accusations of cruel and usual punishment.Officials have spent the last two months doing just that, and a new brief filed this week says executions will be done with either the anesthetic sodium thiopental or the barbiturate pentobarbital.At least seven other states use single-drug lethal injection procedures. Kentucky's change means executions could resume in the commonwealth later this year.A public hearing on the execution proposal is scheduled for Sept. 25 in Frankfort and the new regulations are expected to take effect a month later.
