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Alabama executed a convicted murderer with nitrogen gas on Thursday, carrying out an unprecedented execution and putting the United States once again at the forefront of the debate over the death penalty. The state said the method was humane, but critics called it cruel and experimental.
Kenneth Eugene Smith, 58, was pronounced dead at an Alabama state prison at 8:25 p.m. after inhaling pure nitrogen gas through a mask, causing oxygen deprivation, officials said. This is the first time a new method of execution has been used in the United States since lethal injection, the most commonly used method today, was introduced in 1982.
The state had previously planned to execute Smith, who was convicted of murder in 1988, in 2022, but the lethal injection was halted at the last minute after authorities were unable to connect an IV line.
The execution was a last-minute move in which Mr. Smith’s lawyers argue that the state is using him as a guinea pig for an experimental method of execution, potentially violating the Constitution’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. This was done after a legal battle. A federal court rejected Smith’s bid to block the move, and the latest ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court will be handed down Thursday night.
Liberal justices oppose Supreme Court ruling
Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who dissented with two other liberal justices, wrote: “By failing to kill Smith on the first attempt, Alabama is a ‘guinea pig’ for testing a never-before-tried execution method.” ‘The world is like this,’ he wrote. Looking. ”
The majority justices made no statement.
In a statement released before the execution, Smith and his spiritual advisor, the Rev. Jeff Hood, said, “The eyes of the world are on this impending moral end. Our prayers are with you. “It’s about people not turning their backs on us.” We cannot normalize each other’s suffocation. ”
The state predicted that the nitrogen gas would render him unconscious within seconds and death within minutes. The state attorney told the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals that it would be “the most painless and humane method of execution known to mankind.”
But some doctors and groups are sounding the alarm, and Smith’s lawyers told the Supreme Court that the method violates the Constitution’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment, and that additional laws must be put in place before it can be used on humans. They requested that the execution be halted in order to consider the allegations, citing the need for further scrutiny.
“A little research”
“There is very little research on death from nitrogen hypoxia. As the nation considers a new form of execution that has never been attempted anywhere before, the public needs to ensure that the state properly researches the method and avoids suffering.” “We are interested in making sure we have procedures in place to minimize the suffering of the convicted person,” Smith’s attorneys wrote.
Sotomayor wrote in his dissent that Alabama has shrouded its implementation protocols in secrecy, releasing only heavily redacted versions. She also said Mr Smith should be allowed to obtain evidence about the execution procedures and pursue legal challenges.
“That information is important not only to Smith, who has special reason to fear stretchers, but also to those the state plans to use this novel method to execute after him,” Sotomayor wrote.
“This court has twice previously ignored Mr. Smith’s warnings that Alabama would put him at risk of unconstitutional hardship,” Sotomayor wrote. “I really hope he’s not proven right a second time.”
Justice Elena Kagan wrote a separate dissenting opinion, joined by Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson.
final time
A prison spokeswoman said Smith met with family and spiritual advisers in his final hours.
Hood said by phone that his last meal was a T-bone steak, hash browns, toast and eggs with A1 steak sauce.
“He’s scared of the torture that might happen, but at the same time he’s relieved. One of the things he told me was that he was finally able to get out,” Hood said. Ta.
Smith was one of two people convicted of murder in the 1988 murder of Elizabeth Sennett. Prosecutors said the man and another man were each paid $1,000 to kill Sennett on behalf of the pastor’s husband, who was deeply in debt and wanted to collect insurance money. Ta.
The victim’s son, Charles Sennett Jr., said in an interview with WAAY-TV that Smith “has to pay for what he did.”
“And there are some people out there who say, ‘Well, he doesn’t have to suffer that much.’ So didn’t he ask Mom how he would suffer?” said the son. “That’s all they did. They stabbed her multiple times.”
Execution protocols called for Smith to be strapped to a stretcher in the execution chamber (the same one he was strapped to for several hours during the lethal injection) and to have a “full-face air respirator” placed over his face. was. After being given the opportunity to make closing statements, the director turned on the nitrogen gas from a separate room. According to state protocols, it will be administered through a mask for at least 15 minutes or “5 minutes after the electrocardiogram shows a flat line,” whichever is longer.
“barbaric” and “savage” methods
The Vatican-affiliated Catholic charity Sant’Egidio Community, based in Rome, told the state of Alabama that the method was “barbaric” and “uncivilized” and would bring “indelible shame” to the state. He asked that the law not be executed. Experts appointed by the UN Human Rights Council also warned that the method of execution could violate the prohibition against torture.
Some states are exploring new methods of capital punishment because drugs used in lethal injections have become difficult to obtain. Three states, Alabama, Mississippi, and Oklahoma, have approved nitrogen hypoxia as an execution method, but no state has previously attempted to use this untested method.
Smith’s lawyer had expressed concern that the nitrogen gas flow could cause him to suffocate to death from his own vomit. The state changed the procedure at the last minute so that he would not be fed for eight hours before his execution.
Sennett, 45, was found dead in his home on March 18, 1988, with eight stab wounds to his chest and one on each side of his neck, the coroner said. According to court documents, her husband, Charles Sennett Sr., committed suicide while the investigation focused on him as a suspect. Another man convicted of the murder, John Forrest Parker, was executed in 2010.
Smith’s 1989 conviction was overturned, but he was convicted again in 1996. The jury recommended a life sentence for him 11 to 1, but the judge overturned and sentenced him to death. In Alabama, judges are no longer allowed to overturn jury death sentences.
(AP)
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