LAS VEGAS (AP) — A second condemned killer is asking a federal judge in Las Vegas to add him to legal challenges being made to the never-before-used method that Nevada prison officials want to employ for their first lethal injection in 15 years.
Attorneys for Zane Floyd told a judge Friday they want to add Joseph Weldon Smith to a challenge of an execution plan one lawyer dubbed a venture into the unknown.
Separately, the head of the nonprofit Death Penalty Information Center termed the Nevada plan human experimentation.
The judge has stayed any execution until at least Oct. 18.