MAYA FOA: Maya Foa, I’m the director of the death penalty team at Reprieve. These songs are a small way to say that these words matter. Top Chef’s new season is the perfect show for anyone who misses sports. KAREN: Because they’re essentially using illegal drugs at this point  And so, reporters are just starting to pay more attention. It would get her called out by the United States Supreme Court, and it would spark a global conversation about the American death penalty. MAYA FOA: The second drug is purely cosmetic. KAREN: If you walk in, and in the front it’s just this reception area, but in the back…. CLIP, NEWS: The state appealed all the way to the Supreme Court. And the people who are part of the firing squad are actually volunteers. CLIP, BILL WISEMAN: I was just having the best time and I didn’t want to get whooped. MAYA FOA: Just sort of you know fervently, you know, willing the computer to download the documents, so I could start looking through them, and figuring out this stuff. There was one company that has the marketing authorization for the product, they were sold to another one. They put a hood over their head. This is, from every company I’ve spoken to in India, they say but ‘Why? Story comes from reporter KD Duffin. JAD: What do you think he means by guerilla war? Because now any states that want to keep doing it, they essentially have to go underground to do get those drugs. KAREN: She’s sitting there one night and Clive Stafford Smith, who’s the president of Reprieve, or the head of Reprieve calls and says, MAYA FOA: Look… we’ve got an execution tonight…. But it turns out that this drug--, ARCHIVE, CHIEF JUSTICE JOHN ROBERTS: The first, sodium thiopental--. And so I spent a bit of time there. But if we have a to do, let’s do it. Kittens Kick The Giggly Blue Robot All Summer, More Perfect presents: Adoptive Couple v. Baby Girl. That second drug, the one that paralyzes their muscles--. Like line up against the wall? MAYA FOA: there was no, effectively no FDA approved supplier of the stuff. PAUL RAY: A physician will locate the heart and they’ll pin a target where the heart is. And if we cannot face what we’re doing, and acknowledge it, then we shouldn’t do it. However, the first two episodes are clubbed on Netflix, thus bringing the episode count to 14. Operating out of the back of a driving school. And in 1976 the Supreme Court says, alright. So if they can find who made these drugs and prove that they are not FDA approved then they can probably stop the execution. WARNING: Spoilers ahead for Julie and the Phantoms season 1. KAREN: Well the drugs that they want to use in Arizona have to be FDA approved. And about those little words, “cruel and unusual,” that are embedded in our Eighth Amendment. CLIP, NEWS: Jeffrey Landrigan was executed at 22:26 hours. It serves no medical purpose, the reason it was put into the lethal injection cocktail in the first place was so that if the first drug doesn’t work effectively, the second drug will mask any signs of visible suffering. It’s over. PAUL RAY: Well, it it’s brutal. The episode got me hooked to More Perfect and I heard all the way till season 2 (haven't checked out season 3 yet). I gave this episode a listen the 2nd time. From the Radiolab archives, More Perfect brings you the story that inspired our curiosity about the Supreme Court. How they came to find you or you to find them? The majority come in the summer months for the pleasant air of coastal New England, as well as for the lobster, a … MAYA FOA: You know, it’s-- look, you know there’s a lot of narrative around this being guerilla activism. 2 of 8 justices, liberals Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg said they would have accepted the case, JAD: Clearly more cases are on the way. NINA PERRY: You don’t do driving lessons. And Jay just sort of freestyles this one line, that Bill literally just sits with a yellow legal pad and writes word for word. KAREN: You had situations like this in Arizona, Ohio, CLIP: This drug formula is unconstitutional, because…. KAREN: I really want to talk to a volunteer member of the firing squad. MAYA FOA: Plowing through these documents. KAREN: So after the execution, Maya is doing research all this research. CLIP, NEWS: The Anti-Torture regulation with this text unique in the world, the EU is profoundly committed to the fight against torture and the death penalty. But it’s also one of the drugs used in lethal injection. Big Changes 41m. NINA PERRY: …Uh I’m going to try to go and knock on the door of the Elgon Driving Academy…. PAUL RAY: State Representative House District 13, Utah. I’ll call somebody. He, by his account, wanders through like two and half literature degrees, he becomes a poet. I have one objection to the traditional firing squad that Utah uses. KAREN: There’s an execution in Arizona tonight. Because they said it was being applied unfairly or haphazardly. KAREN: And while I was down there, I actually asked Paul. NINA PERRY: Bye bye. CLIP, MAN: I don’t think they should’ve taken it away in the first place. CLIP, NEWS: This is ridiculous. So we invited some of the best musicians in the world to create songs inspired by each of the 27 amendments; a kind of “Schoolhouse Rock!” for the 21st Century. MAYA FOA: From this company called Lundbeck. And luckily for him this had just happened. So you actually see these emails between states like, ‘Dude, do you have any sodium thiopental?’. NINA PERRY: It doesn’t look too good there’s a--. And they said, "No. KAREN: And interestingly, when it got to the Supreme Court. And the death scene in both situations was bizarrely similar. We have approved death by firing squad. Where the first season ends with Sebastian, presumably, eating Ciel's soul and completing his contract, the new season happens as a result of Claude stealing Ciel's soul before Sebastian has the chance to eat it, thus starting a fight for Ciel's soul. We’re just looking at it more. CLIP, REPORTER: Do you think the death penalty should be reinstituted? The first drug, the anesthetic, that’s kind of our sense of humanity or kindness. I don’t know, at that point, NINA PERRY: No, but I guess it unraveled somewhat to--. The Italian government really didn’t want drugs made in the Seat of the Pope to be used for executions. And it would be extremely significant, because the potassium chloride is this potent acid that people have described as being like fire going through your veins, and being sort of burned alive from the inside. The second season features a spoiled young boy named Alois Trancy, heir to the Trancy earldom, and his mysterious butler, Claude Faustus. You’ve been interrupted several times. And he’s opposed to the death penalty. It’s three drugs…. But let’s do it humanely. KAREN: That’s Robert Blecker, a New York Law School professor, sounding a little bit like Maya. PAUL RAY: We have an abundance. This is not the time of Moses. The complete first season of “Tehran" is now streaming alongside an expanding slate of Apple Originals from all over the world, including “Losing Alice,” a neo-noir psychological thriller from creator, writer and director Sigal Avin, that will debut its fourth episode this Friday. KAREN: And almost immediately, 35 states rewrite their death penalty laws, essentially saying like, no no no we can do this right. She was doing some theater things, but she was like having this quarter life crisis, and didn’t know what to do with her life. CLIP, NEWS: What caught my attention that it was so sudden, so quick. And he had found that in this case.” The resulting episode, which came out on “Radiolab,” in 2013, and is featured again in Season 1 of “More Perfect,” is fascinating. CLIP, JUSTICE ANTHONY KENNEDY: I would like an answer to the question. MAYA FOA: A legal organization that did death penalty cases. I know that-- it was a pretty solemn moment-- I--. So 1972 the death penalty is abolished, 1976 it’s reinstated. Were you surprised when they got in contact with you? CLIP, NEWS: The fact that Utah is adopting it now is an embarrassment to the state. And it struck me as bizarre that we are killing those whom we love in a fashion that so nearly resembles how we are killing those we rightfully detest. CLIP, JUSTICE SCALIA: Putting pressure on the companies that manufacture them, so that the States cannot obtain those two other drugs. This is punishment. Except that it doesn’t look like a pharmacy, because it’s got a big sign on the front that says, Elgon Driving Academy. MAYA FOA: You have a couple of petrol stations, a couple of cafes, and then this pharmacy. The 2nd time, with the knowledge I had about the way law functions a bit more and how our supreme court judges operate, I felt shivers this time while listening to the episode. In a perfect world, for example, the Saints would like to try to re-sign homegrown defensive end Trey Hendrickson, who had 13.5 sacks last season. And I think that if we’re going to have the death penalty, people just have to understand that there’s some savagery involved in it. JAD: Did they have reason to believe that they weren’t FDA approved? In fact some of those cases have just started to arrive. It was cleaner than I expected. CLIP, SCOTT THOMPSON, KOTV: Bill Wiseman was a rising star back then, he loved politics. KAREN: So Clive says, there’s an execution tonight. KAREN DUFFIN: Can we watch teletubbies for a second? NINA PERRY: I can’t see any evidence of driving. And that seemed to carry on for the last 60 to 120 seconds. I want to be a politician. MAYA FOA: ‘Why? CLIP, BILL WISEMAN: The same thing everyone else does, throw ourselves on the mercy of God and say that we have done wrong and we are sorry. KAREN: Why is it that, do you think that the firing squad itself created this response? Five bullets directly to the heart. He moved a little bit. On this episode of More Perfect, we go all the way back to a case that, in a lot of ways, started it all. View Comments. CLIP, NEWS: It’s a cruel relic of Old West justice. But everyone seems to agree that we shouldn’t fool ourselves. We reached out to a bunch of musicians and asked them to create a … A young man with a violent past enters a mysterious clinic where the patients wildly transform their bodies and minds using genetic engineering. KAREN: Do you have a lack of volunteers or an abundance of volunteers? CLIP, NEWS: The stay was put in place due to concern over lethal injection drugs. And it’s unfortunate that it is. KAREN: And as a result what you’ve seen is that as a result things have gotten very DIY. Why would they use medicines?’. Why would they use medicines?’. And we’re going to start the series off with a story that isn’t so much a courtroom drama. You made it a problem. He is Dream Pharma. NINA PERRY: Hi, I’m looking for Dream Pharma… is that you?