A Contra Costa County judge last week sentenced Darryl Kemp to death for the random rape and murder of a young jogger. But chances are that Kemp will not be executed anytime soon, if at all. He is 73. It takes an average of 20 years to execute an inmate in California. And capital punishment has been suspended since February 2006 when Michael Morales came within two hours of execution for the rape and murder of a 17-year-old girl reports the Associated Press in the San Francisco Chronicle.

On Tuesday, the return to capital punishment takes a step forward when prison officials convene a daylong public hearing on proposed rules for lethally injecting condemned inmates with three drugs. Even if the proposal passes legal muster, reinstating the death penalty is expected to take up to a year.

Whatever is decided in California, where there are 680 condemned inmates, is expected to shape how other states carry out executions.

Since the U.S. Supreme Court signed off on Kentucky’s lethal injection process last year and lifted a brief nationwide moratorium, 36 states and the federal government, which employ the execution method, have experienced varying degrees of success in restarting capital punishment.

A federal judge in 2006 halted executions in California until officials expanded the death chamber at San Quentin prison and provided more executioner training and other upgrades to ensure the condemned do not suffer cruel and unusual punishment.

The Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has since constructed a new death chamber and the proposed new regulations require execution team members to undergo monthly mock executions. The rules would require three syringes, each filled with different drugs, to be administered by staff licensed to give injections in California. A physician must be on hand to declare death.

A state judge ruled that the 42 pages of execution protocols, including instructions for mixing and injecting the drugs, had to be subjected to California’s lengthy regulatory process, starting with a 45-day public comment period.

Corrections officials have received more than 1,400 written comments, the vast majority opposed to the proposed procedures or death penalty generally.

For the mother of Morales’ victim, the wait for his execution has been too long.

“There has been too much ‘red tape,’ paperwork, and time lost in this matter,” Barbara Christian, the mother of Terri Winchell, wrote in an e-mail. “Other victims such as I are grieving and waiting for justice for their loved ones. We are the ones bearing the brunt of this fiasco. The lethal injection is humane with no pain. Let’s get on with it.”

Maryland has embarked on a public comment process like California’s. A federal judge has ordered a halt to executions in Missouri. And other states such as Texas have carried out a combined 68 lethal injection executions since the Supreme Court’s ruling in 2008.

Read more here: California’s long process to resuming executions