OKLAHOMA CITY — A federal appeals court has granted a stay of execution for two Oklahoma inmates who were scheduled to receive lethal injections in the coming weeks.
A three-member panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit issued the stays Wednesday for death row inmates John Marion Grant and Julius Jones.
The court ruled that a federal district judge in Oklahoma erred when he removed Grant, Jones and three other inmates from a federal lawsuit challenging Oklahoma's lethal injection protocols.
U.S. District Judge Stephen Friot removed the five inmates because they did not select an alternative method of execution.