Roy Lee Ward v. Robert E. Carter, Jr., Commissioner of the Indiana Department of Correction, and Ron Neal, Superintendent of the Indiana State Prison, In Their Official Capacities

Goff, Justice.

Plaintiff challenges the Department of Correction's change to Indiana's lethal injection protocol, arguing the combination of drugs used in executions is a substantive rule that must be promulgated pursuant to the Administrative Rules and Procedures Act. We disagree. Because the Department's decision to add Brevital to the lethal injection cocktail does not carry the effect of law-that is, the change does not impose standards regulating Ward's conduct-we hold the new three-drug protocol is not a rule and, therefore, not subject to the Administrative Rules and Procedures Act.

Factu…