Anthony Jay Chapman, known as A. Jay Chapman, (born Jan 1939) is an American

physician A physician, medical practitioner (British English), medical doctor, or simply doctor is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through the Medical education, study, Med ...

and

forensic pathologist Forensic pathology is pathology that focuses on determining the cause of death by examining a corpse. A post mortem examination is performed by a medical examiner or forensic pathologist, usually during the investigation of criminal law cases an ...

who, in 1977, created the first three-drug protocol used for

lethal injection Lethal injection is the practice of injecting one or more drugs into a person (typically a barbiturate, paralytic, and potassium) for the express purpose of causing death. The main application for this procedure is capital punishment, but t ...

, the most commonly used form of

capital punishment Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty and formerly called judicial homicide, is the state-sanctioned killing of a person as punishment for actual or supposed misconduct. The sentence (law), sentence ordering that an offender b ...

in the United States. While Chapman was

chief medical examiner The medical examiner is an appointed official in some American jurisdictions who is trained in pathology and investigates deaths that occur under unusual or suspicious circumstances, to perform post-mortem examinations, and in some jurisdictio ...

for the

State of Oklahoma Oklahoma ( ; Choctaw: , ) is a landlocked state in the South Central region of the United States. It borders Texas to the south and west, Kansas to the north, Missouri to the northeast, Arkansas to the east, New Mexico to the west, and Colo ...

, he was asked by legislator William Wiseman to develop the method. In recent years, Chapman has cast doubt on the lethal injection procedure in the United States, specifically with regards to the lack of training required for those administering the drugs and the botched executions that have occurred.

References

Living people American forensic pathologists Lethal injection 1939 births {{capital-punishment-stub