Alabama offers to bring nitrogen executions to other US states

The US state of Alabama offered assistance to other states in carrying out the death penalty through nitrogen gas asphyxiation this Friday (26), a few hours after the method was used for the first time to kill Kenneth Smith, a prisoner convicted of murder in 1988.

The State has also promised more such executions: Attorney General Steve Marshall said that another 43 inmates on the death row line have chosen asphyxiation over lethal injection since the method was approved by lawmakers in 2018.

Alabama called the new method “humane,” while human rights groups say it is cruel and torturous.

“Alabama has done it, and now you can too, and we are ready to help implement this method in other states,” Marshall, a Republican, said Friday.

Lawmakers from Oklahoma and Mississippi have also authorized nitrogen asphyxiation as a method of execution in their states, but officials have not yet used it.

Marshall said nitrogen asphyxiation, the first new method to be used since lethal injections began in 1982, “is no longer an untested method.”

“It’s proven,” he said.

There have been conflicting accounts of how violent the method was from state officials and witnesses to the execution of Smith, who, unusually, survived an initial attempt in 2022 when executioners were unable to find an intravenous line to insert the lethal injection. .

Alabama estimated in court documents that with the new method, Smith would become unconscious in about 30 seconds and die shortly afterward. The executioners strapped an industrial safety respirator mask made by a Canadian manufacturer called Allegro Industries to his face and connected it to a cylinder of pure nitrogen.

Five journalists allowed to witness the execution through a glass window stated that he remained conscious for several minutes after the nitrogen flow began, and then began to shake and twitch on the gurney for about two minutes.

The Reverend Jeff Hood, who remained by Smith's side as a spiritual advisor after signing a waiver acknowledging the risks of nitrogen asphyxiation, said Smith repeatedly threw his head forward as he fought for his life.

Alabama officials said everything went as expected. They said Smith apparently held his breath as long as he could and suggested the contortions may have been “involuntary movements.”

“What occurred last night was textbook,” Marshall said.

Smith was convicted of the murder of Elizabeth Sennett, after agreeing to receive $1,000 to kill her alongside accomplices at the behest of her husband, a pastor who later committed suicide.

Source: CNN Brasil

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