KANSAS CITY, MO - After learning that an inmate received a lower-than-expected dose of anesthesia at his execution, Missouri's prison director said Tuesday he soon would move to clarify lethal injection procedures.

Larry Crawford, the state's Corrections Department director, made that announcement during testimony in a hearing on whether Missouri's lethal injection procedure constitutes cruel and unusual punishment.

Michael Anthony Taylor, who was sentenced to death for the 1989 kidnapping, rape and murder of 15-year-old Ann Harrison of Kansas City, sued the state over that issue in U.S. District Court.

The issue is being contested in courts around the country. Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court allowed prisoners further latitude to file such suits.

In researching their case, Taylor's lawyers discovered that Missouri prison personnel had administered half the expected dose of anesthesia to Marlin Gray in October before injecting a drug that paralyzed him and then a drug that killed him.

The anesthesia, sodium pentothal, is used to render a prisoner unconscious so he does not feel effects of the third drug, potassium chloride, which doctors have said can cause excruciating pain.

Prison workers prepared a similar sodium pentothal dose — 2.5 grams rather than 5 grams called for in prison procedures — for Taylor's scheduled execution in February. A court delayed that execution so Taylor could pursue his current appeal.

“I have faith we have done constitutional and humane executions in the past,” Crawford said Tuesday.

Crawford said he soon would issue a directive formalizing the injection protocol and limiting the discretion of any physician who assists.

Under the new directive, any anesthesia dosage change must be approved by the department director, Crawford said.

Mark Dershwitz, a University of Massachusetts anesthesiologist, testified for the state that cutting the dosage in half only would increase the possibility of consciousness in a condemned person by “a tiny amount.”

A typical adult will fall into unconsciousness about 30 seconds after receiving 200 to 300 milligrams of sodium pentothal, about one-tenth what Gray received, he said.

Among states that use lethal injection, sodium pentothal dosages vary from 1.5 grams to 5 grams, according to testimony at the hearing.

Still, Taylor's experts argued that the speed with which executioners inject the drugs might be a problem.

“There is a high potential for significant pain because not enough time elapses to allow the sodium pentothal to take effect,” said Thomas Henthorn, an anesthesiologist from the University of Colorado.

He also said that Missouri should allow inmates to fall into a deeper state of unconsciousness before injecting the final two drugs.

Mark Heath, a Columbia University anesthesiologist, testified that the anonymous physician who assists in Missouri's lethal injection program is not qualified to administer general anesthesia.

U.S. District Judge Fernando Gaitan said he would take under advisement the question of whether the state's execution procedures are cruel or unusual and rule soon.