Wednesday, Nov. 8, 2017 | 3:59 p.m.
Nevada death row inmate Scott Raymond Dozier confers with Lori Teicher, a federal public defender involved in his case, during a Thursday, Aug. 17, 2017, appearance in Clark County District Court in Las Vegas.
A judge in Las Vegas who has been hearing a challenge of the state's untried lethal injection plan was set Wednesday to ask an inmate one last time whether he had changed his mind about becoming the first person to be executed in Nevada in 11 years.
Scott Raymond Dozier, 46, a twice-convicted murderer, has given up all appeals and repeatedly told Clark County District Court Judge Jennifer Togliatti that he wants his death sentence carried out.
The judge scheduled a videoconference from the state prison in Ely, where Dozier has been on death row since 2007 and his execution is set for Tuesday in a newly constructed death chamber.
After killing people in Phoenix and Las Vegas, Dozier stood before the judge in August and said he wanted to die and isn't concerned that it could be painful.
"If they tell me, 'Listen, there's a good chance it's going to be a real miserable experience for those two hours before you actually expire,' I'm still going to do it," Dozier said at the time. "I'm not going to waver on this."
But he is letting federal public defenders examine how the state decided on a three-drug combination that has never been used for lethal injections in any state.
The plan, approved by a chief state medical officer who resigned last week, uses the sedative diazepam, the powerful synthetic opioid fentanyl, and the muscle paralytic cisatracurium. The procedure is expected to depress Dozier's breathing to the point that he suffocates.
Unlike other states with the death penalty, Nevada does not use a heart-stopping medication such as pentobarbital, which was used in the Oct. 12 execution of 38-year-old Robert Pruett in Texas.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada and an official at the Berkeley Law Death Penalty Clinic in California have raised fears that Dozier will remain conscious but paralyzed and suffer while he suffocates — even though observers won't be able to tell.
Judge Togliatti has allowed Nevada prison officials and the state attorney general to keep written details of the execution protocol secret despite open-records arguments from David Anthony and Lori Teicher, the deputy federal public defenders handling the case.
"The public has a right to know how the state will kill someone," Anthony said.
The judge on Monday expressed concern about the effect of the sudden resignation of chief Nevada state doctor John DiMuro as the medical official with responsibility for the execution.
DiMuro left a sworn statement for the court saying his departure had nothing to do with the execution, and that he stood by the lethal injection protocol he had prepared.
Dr. Leon Ravin, state psychiatric medical director since 2015, has taken over at least temporarily as the state's top doctor.
Anthony noted the chief state medical officer has a key role in an execution protocol, including preparing the drugs to be used.
DiMuro, an anesthesiologist, operated pain management practices in the Reno area before he was named the state medical chief in July 2016.
