Nearly two months after Tony Carruthers’ botched execution, his sister, Tonya Hervey, has filed a medical malpractice complaint with the Tennessee Department of Health against the doctor who attempted to set an IV into Carruthers’ chest.
Carruthers was set to be executed in May, but his execution was called off after about 90 minutes when medical personnel could not find a suitable vein for a secondary line. During the process, which a Commercial Appeal reporter was in the witness chamber for, Carruthers could be heard groaning shortly before the execution was called off.
That groaning, according to Carruthers’ attorney and the complaint, was when Dr. Mark Walton Fowler attempted to set a central line. Both Carruthers’ attorney and the complaint against Fowler alleged he injected Carruthers with lidocaine, asked if he could feel anything, and cut Carruthers’ chest despite Carruthers saying he could feel it…