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BY GRAHAM LEE BREWER, Staff WriterA federal judge Monday declined to stop a series of upcoming executions in Oklahoma, allowing the state to use the same drug combination it did in the April execution of Clayton Derrell Lockett. In a ruling from the bench Monday, U.S. District Judge Stephen Friot denied a request from 21 death row inmates asking the court to bar the state from carrying out their lethal injections in a manner they claim presents a high risk for being cruel and unusual. Friot ruled that the inmates and their counsel failed to show the state’s new execution protocol, which was revised in the wake of Lockett’s execution, presented a risk for either pain and suffering or a lingering death. The first of the three drugs administered to Lockett during his execution, midazolam, was the focus of much of the hearings in the case, which took place last week.Read more on NewsOK.com