Arizona is set for its 2nd execution this year. It could be torturous. The state will kill Richard Djerf on Friday. Experts warn his execution by lethal injection could be deceptively agonizing.

The drug used for executions in Arizona, pentobarbital, is supposed to render a person unconscious before quickly and peacefully stopping the body’s core functions.

Many experts, including Virginia law professor Corinna Barrett Lain, say something much more agonizing often goes on below the surface. Lain — who was in Phoenix last week to talk about her book on lethal injection, “Secrets of the Killing State” — said patients who die by lethal injection often suffer pulmonary edema while not fully anesthetized, meaning they painfully die as their lungs fill up with fluid. Read the full article.