Death penalty, medical ethics collide in Kentucky

A group of doctors is seeking an opinion from the Kentucky Board of Medical Licensure on whether Fletcher can sign death warrants without running the risk of having his medical license revoked. The board is not scheduled to take up the matter until at least January, and would not comment in the meantime.

On Nov. 8, Fletcher signed a death warrant for Thomas Clyde Bowling, 51, convicted of shooting to death the husband-and-wife owners of a dry cleaning business in 1990. Bowling is set to die by lethal injection Nov. 30.

Fletcher's executive counsel, John Roach, said the Republican governor did not violate AMA guidelines or other ethical standards.

''By signing a death warrant, in no way is Governor Ernie Fletcher participating in the conduct of an execution," Roach said. ''Governor Fletcher's role under the law is consistent with the roles of judges fulfilling their legal duty and jurors fulfilling their legal obligations regardless of their professions."

The AMA guidelines forbid doctors to actively take part in an execution or to take any ''action which would directly cause the death of the condemned" or ''which would assist, supervise or contribute" to the death of the inmate.

In a statement, Dr. Michael Goldrich, chairman of the AMA Council on Ethical and Judicial Affairs, stopped short of saying whether the governor violated the guidelines.

Goldrich said the code prohibits any role by a doctor, passive or active, in an execution. But he also said the code ''does not speak to individuals with a medical degree who no longer maintain any involvement with medicine and are engaged in activities that are outside the sphere of the medical profession."

Fletcher, 52, earned his medical degree at the University of Kentucky and was a family practitioner until he was elected to Congress in 1998. He was elected governor last year and is still licensed as a physician in Kentucky.