Prisoner objects to proposed change in execution briefings

PHOENIX — A death row prisoner who could be among the first in Arizona to be executed in almost seven years is opposing a move that would reduce the amount of time he would have respond to the state’s request for his execution warrant. Prosecutors asked the Arizona Supreme Court two weeks ago to modify the briefing schedule in their bid to get an execution warrant for Clarence Dixon after they revealed the shelf life of the state’s lethal injection drug was half as long than they previously thought. In a filing Tuesday, Dixon’s lawyer Cary Sandman said the state’s new scheduling proposal would give her only four days to respond to the execution warrant request, whereas she had 10 days under the current schedule. Dixon’s projected Oct. 19 execution date was based around a belief by a compounding pharmacist that the drug pentobarbital had a shelf life of 90 days. The state now says until specialized testing on a sample batch of the drug is done, the shelf life of the pentobarbital to be compounded for Dixon’s execution would be 45 days.