A diverse collection of groups from across the political spectrum are calling on Gov. Katie Hobbs to complete an independent review of how the state carries out executions.
Hobbs issued an executive order in 2023 pausing executions to allow for the review. Questions arose about the efficacy of the state’s processes following high-profile problems, including a botched execution in 2014.
The state hired retired federal judge David Duncan to carry out that review, but Hobbs dismissed him last month.
“Your review has, unfortunately, faced repeated challenges, and I no longer have confidence that I will receive a report from you that will accomplish the purpose and goals of the Executive Order that I issued nearly two years ago,” Hobbs wrote in a Nov. 26 letter to Duncan, accusing him of going beyond the scope of the work he was hired to perform.
Weeks later, Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes sought permission from the Arizona Supreme Court to carry out the state’s first execution since 2022.
The ACLU of Arizona, Libertarian Policy Institute, Conservatives Concerned, Arizona Attorneys for Criminal Justice and Arizonans for Transparency and Accountability in Corrections accused Hobbs of canceling Duncan’s investigation because she disagreed with the retired judge’s conclusion that there are fundamental problems with how the state executes death row inmates.
According to a draft outline of Duncan’s report, released by the governor’s office, Duncan determined that “lethal injection is not a viable method of execution in actual practice.”
The group said Hobbs made a commitment to voters that her administration would engage in a transparent review of the state’s death penalty processes.
“Now, two years later, executions in Arizona can still not be carried out humanely, yet the governor nonetheless is doing a 180 and is now vowing to once again carry out executions in the state,” said Jared Keenan, legal director for the ACLU of Arizona.
They also accused Hobbs and Mayes of playing politics as both prepare to seek reelection in two years.
Hobbs, who hasn’t overseen any executions as governor, defended her decision, saying there were legitimate reasons to end Duncan’s review, which was supposed to focus on “reviewing the state’s procurement of execution drugs, as well as the policies and protocols in place for carrying out an execution under existing law,” according to the Nov. 26 letter.
“Just one example of that was he started saying that we should execute people by firing squad,” Hobbs said. “And that is clearly unconstitutional, not the job he was hired to do.”
Duncan’s draft report does mention “the firing squad” method as an alternative that overcomes issues the state has experienced with lethal injection, including problems procuring execution drugs and the personnel needed to administer them.
“Presumably skilled marksmen and markswomen are among the employees of the ADCR&R and the material, rifles and ammunition, are readily available and subject to no limitations on their use,” Duncan wrote. “While visibly violent … execution by firing squad produces unconsciousness almost immediately and final death is achieved very soon thereafter.”
But Keenan said Hobbs was misinterpreting the passage.
“So I believe he was using that statement to make a comparison and not as a recommendation that Arizona adopted the firing squad as a method of execution,” he said.
More important, Keenan and others argued, are the problems Duncan found, “from corrections officials seeking to learn on the eve of an execution what doses of lethal drugs to administer from Wikipedia, to shipments of state procured lethal drugs delivered to a private home in Phoenix with no apparent or verifiable chain of custody, to the storage of lethal drugs in unmarked jars with no labeling whatsoever.”
The Arizona Republic reported Duncan also found the state paid a medical director and paramedic $20,000 each for three executions but did not issue IRS tax forms for those payments.
Nicholas Cote, states strategist with Conservatives Concerned, said all government expenditures deserve scrutiny.
“That's true for road maintenance and school construction, and it should be true for the death penalty, an irreversible expression of government power,” Cote said.
The groups are calling on Hobbs to complete the independent review and release it to the public.
“If there are flaws in the system, the last thing the governor should be doing is pushing forward to kill people before those flaws are fixed,” said Nicholas Sarwark, executive director of the Libertarian Policy Institute. “How can Arizonans hold their elected officials accountable if they're prevented from knowing?”
Hobbs said she is satisfied with an internal review conducted by Department of Corrections Director Ryan Thornell, who joined the Hobbs administration in 2023 after working in corrections in Maine, a state without the death penalty.
“They have thoroughly gone through every procedure and process and updated them,'' she said. “And I'm confident in the process.”
Both Hobbs and Mayes say the death penalty is the law in Arizona.
“I am comfortable with requesting an execution warrant from the Supreme Court,” Mayes said. “I believe that the Department of Corrections is prepared, is ready to move forward.”
The Duncan report — or at least the draft outline released by Hobbs’ office — has also exposed friction within the Democratic Party.
Rep. Patty Contreras (D-Phoenix) introduced legislation that would ask Arizona voters to abolish the death penalty.
In a statement, Contreras said she was “disappointed that a former federal magistrate's study on Arizona's death penalty was not allowed to be completed. His preliminary draft concluded there is no humane way to kill a person via lethal injection.”
Capitol Media Services contributed to this report
