Utah death row inmate loses latest court appeal
Jul 30, 2024, 4:24 PM | Updated: 5:46 pm
SALT LAKE CITY — A Utah inmate set to be executed in 10 days, on August 8, just lost another court appeal Tuesday.
Attorneys for convicted killer Taberon Honie asked Utah’s 3rd District Court for a preliminary injunction and claimed his constitutional rights were being violated, but the judge disagreed.
Honie’s attorneys argued that because the State of Utah made a last-minute switch in the drug being used for his execution, they didn’t have a clear plan to pull it off without him potentially suffering.
But that’s not how the Judge saw it and ruled against the injunction.
Taberon Honie is on death row for the brutal murder of his ex-girlfriend’s mother back in 1998 and is scheduled to be executed on August 8 by lethal injection.
During Tuesday’s hearing, Honie’s attorneys argued the state’s execution plan is too vague and inconsistent, and may lead them to make mistakes.
However, the Utah Attorney General’s Office countered by stating their plan has more specifics than other states that use the same lethal drug, pentobarbital, the same one Honie identified as okay.
The judge agreed and ruled Honie wasn’t entitled to more specifics.
“Assuming there is a due process right to notice, Mr. Honie has not sufficiently pled that any inconsistencies, or deficiencies in the Utah Department of Corrections protocols or procedures will cause actual harm of a constitutional right,” Judge Linda Jones, Utah’s 3rd Judicial District Court, said.
Another big question that went into Tuesday’s hearing is if the judge had ruled in favor of Honie, what would that have meant for the 5th Circuit Court ruling last month signing off on his execution?
Tuesday, Jones said she knows she doesn’t have the power to upend that ruling, which would’ve caused a lot of legal questions as to which court ruling would’ve had the final say, and which one the State and Honie would go with. But she put that to rest.
So where does this leave the case now?
Honie is still scheduled to die on August 8. His attorneys now plan to look at Tuesday’s ruling and see what room that leaves them for an appeal before the Utah Supreme Court.
