Whether it comports with due process for a state to refuse to provide a condemned inmate information about his method of execution that would enable him meaningfully to mount an Eighth Amendment challenge to that method

QUESTIONS PRESENTED Idaho currently has one of the, if not the, most stringent execution-secrecy regimes in the country, seeking to execute prisoners while informing them of nothing more than the name of the lethal injection chemical that is to be used. Any other information which might allow a death-row inmate to evaluate the quality, effectiveness, reliability, or provenance of the chemical is withheld. Instead, the State has provided only a heavily-redacted two-page document from a contracted laboratory, which is not dated, signed, or connected to the State’s chemicals in any way, and which does not indicate the use of industry-standard testing protocols. This document purportedly asserts that the chemical falls within normal limits. In denying Mr. Creech’s motion for preliminary injunction the district court accepted this document at face value, and after refusing to accept formal briefing the Court of Appeals rejected his appeal of that denial in twenty-three hours. The questions presented are: Whether it comports with due process for a state to refuse to provide a condemned inmate information about his method of execution that would enable him meaningfully to mount an Eighth Amendment challenge to that method; and Whether it comports with due process for the federal courts to artificially truncate a death-row inmate’s only appeal challenging the withholding of all execution information bar the name of the lethal injection chemical. PETITION FOR WRIT OF CERTIORARI — Page i