As a result existing proposals are sometimes misunderstood and it is often unclear whether the problems arising during their executions are due to implementation bugs or more fundamental design issues.
Brian Kammer, Hill's lawyer, said he was relieved the stay had been issued just three hours before the execution was due to have taken place.
As an example, he cites one of the inmates who was granted a reprieve 23 minutes before his execution was due.
In the end his only hope was the US supreme court, and for a moment at 7pm, just as the execution was due to take place, it seemed that the justices had ordered a stay.
Shortly before the execution was due to start, his son, daughter and daughter-in-law, who were with him at the time, asked me to come with them as witness.
"Ten days before the execution was due, I saw my son in a dream asking me not to take revenge, but I couldn't convince myself to forgive," she told the Guardian.
In March 2010, Skinner was taken to the death chamber 40 miles away from Livingston in Huntsville, but less than an hour before the execution was due to take place, the US supreme court granted a stay while it considered whether to allow Skinner to request DNA tests.
However, just an hour before his execution was due to start at 7 p.m. CT, the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals delayed it until 8 15 p.m. in order to review another request for a stay.
It is safe to say that no one's mind was changed; another federal execution is due in Terre Haute next week.
The Supreme Court's brief consideration of Arthur's final appeal moved his execution time from 6 p.m. to 11 p.m.— an hour before the execution order was due to expire.
According to Pacheco, El Greco's perturbed, violent and at times seemingly careless-in-execution art was due to a studied effort to acquire a freedom of style.
