An Alabama death row inmate who survived a botched lethal injection was set to be executed Thursday using nitrogen gas – a method the UN has called “inhumane” and which veterinarians have deemed too cruel to use when decontaminating animals.
Kenneth Eugene Smith, 58, will become the country’s first inmate to be executed by nitrogen gas, a federal appeals court ruled Wednesday, rejecting Smith’s second attempt to stop the experiment, which would use a method the United Nations equated to “torture.” according to Times UK.
After spending more than three decades on death row for a murder-for-hire in 1989, Smith will be executed at Holman Prison in Atmore, Alabama at some point during a 30-hour window that begins at 1 a.m. EST Thursday.
Last week, UN spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani urged Alabama to abandon its plans to use nitrogen gas, saying it could “amount to torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment and punishment, under international human rights law.”
Although nitrogen gas has never been used to kill humans in the US – and Alabama is only one of three states that allows it to be used – the method is sometimes used to clean animals.
Kenneth Eugene Smith, 58, will be the first person to be killed by nitrogen gas on Thursday. via REUTERS
Even so, the American Veterinary Medical Association has warned against the use of nitrogen gas to destroy most mammals, calling the practice “inconvenient.”
The method, which involves administering nitrogen gas through a face mask and removing oxygen from the body, can cause the person unnecessary suffering and can even threaten the health of others in the room, experts have warned.
Still, officials are ready to go ahead with Smith’s execution. Judges with the 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday said in a 3-2 decision that there was “no doubt that death by nitrogen hypoxia is new and novel” but that the inmate had failed to prove the experimental method violated the constitutional ban on cruelty. and extraordinary punishment.
“Because we are bound by Supreme Court precedent, Smith cannot say that the use of nitrogen hypoxia, as a new and novel method, would amount to cruel and unusual punishment that violates the Eighth Amendment by itself,” the majority wrote in its opinion. .
The new method involves administering nitrogen gas through a face mask and depriving the body of oxygen. AP
Circuit Judge Jill A. Pryor disagreed with the ruling, saying there was “real doubt” about the protocol and what Smith would experience.
“He will die. The cost, I fear, is Mr. Smith’s human dignity, and ours,” Pryor wrote in the dissent.
The federal decision is the second this month to reject Smith’s attempt to halt the death penalty, where his lawyers argued that the state was trying to make the convicted killer a “test subject” for an untried execution method after he survived a previous state trial. to kill him by lethal injection.
Smith’s lawyers are expected to appeal to the US Supreme Court in a last-ditch effort to stop the execution scheduled for Thursday.
The legal team had already tried to seek a stay at the top court, but the Supreme Court rejected its argument on Wednesday that it was unconstitutional for the state to attempt a second execution after he survived the first sentence.
Smith has been on death row for more than three decades for his involvement in a murder-for-hire in 1988. Find a grave
“Two courts have now rejected Smith’s claim,” said Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall. “I remain confident that the Supreme Court will side with justice, and Smith’s death sentence will be carried out tomorrow.”
The Alabama Department of Corrections tried to give Smith a lethal injection in 2022 but called it off when officials failed to connect the two veins needed to proceed.
Earlier this week, Smith told The Guardian that the botched execution left him with mental disabilities, including post-traumatic stress disorder.
Since the failed attempt, the drug used in lethal injection has become rare, leading Alabama to allow nitrogen hypoxia as a method of execution.
Smith survived a botched lethal injection in 2022 that allegedly left him with PTSD. AP
The government predicted that Smith would lose consciousness within seconds and die within minutes, but critics have slammed the method as too experimental and believe we don’t understand the true effects of the drug.
If carried out, Smith’s execution of nitrogen gas would be the first time a new method has been introduced since lethal injection was first used in 1982.
Smith was one of two men convicted in the murder-for-hire of a preacher’s wife in 1988. Each man was paid $1,000 to kill Elizabeth Sennett on behalf of her husband, Charles Sennett, who wanted to collect insurance money.
Her husband died of suicide a week after her death.
There will be 24 executions carried out in the US in 2023, all using lethal injection.
With Postal wire
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Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
