Arkansas’s plan to carry out an unprecedented series of executions has been thrown into chaos, after judges ruled to halt temporarily the state’s plan.

Hundreds of death penalty opponents rallied at the State Capitol in Little Rock on Friday, as state Judge Wendell Griffen issued a temporary stay of the executions over concerns the state used false pretenses to obtain the drug vecuronium bromide, which is one of a cocktail of drugs slated to be used in the executions.

The following day, federal Judge Kristine Baker also temporarily blocked the state’s execution plans from proceeding over concerns about another one of the execution drugs: the sedative midazolam. Arkansas is appealing the rulings.

If Arkansas prevails, it’s slated to begin its executions today. Arkansas has planned to execute eight prisoners this month. No state has ever sent as many inmates to the death chamber in as short a period of time. Arkansas is rushing to carry out the executions before the state’s supply of the sedative midazolam expires. But midazolam has been linked to painful botched executions. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor has described it as “the chemical equivalent of being burned at the stake.”