OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Oklahoma's governor says no executions will take place in the state until she has "complete confidence" in the system.
Gov. Mary Fallin made the comments Thursday after The Oklahoman newspaper reported that prison officials used the wrong drug when the state executed inmate Charles Warner in January. The governor said she wasn't informed that potassium acetate may have been used until last week, when she halted another execution because potassium acetate was delivered instead of potassium chloride.
Fallin says the doctor and pharmacist working with the corrections department said the two drugs are "medically interchangeable." Death penalty experts said last week that potassium acetate had never been used in a U.S. execution before.
Fallin says the state attorney general's office is conducting an inquiry into the Warner execution and that she's "fully supportive" of the investigation.