Glossip v. Gross

Glossip v. Gross
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued April 29, 2015 Decided June 29, 2015
Full case name	Richard E. Glossip, et al. v. Kevin J. Gross, et al.
Docket no.	14-7955
Citations	576 U.S. 863 (more) 135 S. Ct. 2726; 192 L. Ed. 2d 761
Argument	Oral argument
Opinion announcement	Opinion announcement
Case history
Prior	affirming denial of injunction, 776 F.3d 721 (10th Cir. 2015); denying stays of execution, 135 S. Ct. 824 (2015) (Sotomayor, J., dissenting); cert. granted, 135 S. Ct. 1173 (2015).
Subsequent	denying stay of execution, 136 S. Ct. 26 (September 30, 2015) (Breyer, J., dissenting).
Holding
Petitioners have the burden of proof that a method of execution involves any risk of harm which is substantial when compared to a known and available alternative method.
Court membership
Chief Justice John Roberts Associate Justices Antonin Scalia · Anthony Kennedy Clarence Thomas · Ruth Bader Ginsburg Stephen Breyer · Samuel Alito Sonia Sotomayor · Elena Kagan
Case opinions
Majority	Alito, joined by Roberts, Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas
Concurrence	Scalia, joined by Thomas
Concurrence	Thomas, joined by Scalia
Dissent	Breyer, joined by Ginsburg
Dissent	Sotomayor, joined by Ginsburg, Breyer, Kagan
Laws applied
U.S. Const. amend. VIII; 42 U.S.C. § 1983

Glossip v. Gross, 576 U.S. 863 (2015), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held, 5–4, that lethal injections using midazolam to kill prisoners convicted of capital crimes do not constitute cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The Court found that condemned prisoners can only challenge their method of execution after providing a known and available alternative method.