Should Death Row Inmates be allowed to Donate Their Organs?

Christian Longo, a death row inmate in Oregon, is petitioning prison officials to allow him to donate his organs upon execution. In order for Longo's organs to be usable, the execution would need to be altered from a three-drug solution to a single injection of one lethal dose. This may not raise any immediate red flags, but I argue in this piece that there are very serious ethical implications in allowing this seemingly benign request.

At first blush, offering the nation’s capital offenders the opportunity to donate their organs sounds like a promising solution to America’s organ shortage. However, harvesting organs from death row inmates establishes a dangerous precedent that sets policymakers and American society down a precarious path. Specifically, prisoners are vulnerable to coercion, given the power prison officials hold over inmates. While such abuse of power sounds unthinkable, it is a very real possibility, and we needn’t look far for a recent example. In 2007, for instance, South Carolina proposed sentence reductions in exchange for kidneys and bone marrow. This example sends a clear warning that prisoners could be coerced to opt-in as donors once we start down this path. 

Additionally, the potential to save lives creates a perverse incentive to issue death sentences—Sentencing in death penalty cases requires a jury to choose between death, life, life without parole, and a term of years. If a jury is wavering on a sentence, it is reasonable to assume that the societal benefits of organ donation can skew the decision toward death, making this a morally and ethically objectionable policy. In that same vein, tying organ donation to capital punishment legitimizes the death penalty and could hinder future efforts to end capital punishment.

Furthermore, the arguably humane standard with which death sentences are carried out could be compromised to facilitate organ donation. Specifically, lethal injection, as performed in most states, renders the liver and kidneys useless for transplant, so the method would need to be modified for organ donors, and this modification may come at the expense of a painless and dignified death. Moreover, transplanted organs are most viable when harvested from brain-dead donors whose hearts are still beating, so it is very possible that donors on death row would have their organs harvested while under a drug induced coma. This preserves the organ’s integrity, but it borders on cruel and unusual punishment and pushes the bounds of medical ethics. In closing, allowing death row inmates to donate their organs leads the prison system down a slippery slope toward exploitation. 

This is one side of the issue. I'd like to hear your thoughts.