Will the nitrogen poisoning of prisoners be replicated in other US states?

Atmore, Alabama –

The use of nitrogen in Alabama to execute an inmate for the first time in US history could catch on in other states and change the way the death penalty is carried out in the country, just as it has with more than 40 lethal injections . According to experts years ago.

State’s Attorney Steve Marshall said Friday that the execution of 58-year-old Kenneth Eugene Smith went as planned and that if other states want to begin using nitrogen in executions, his office is prepared to help them. Smith was convicted of the murder of a woman for hire in 1988.

“Alabama has done it, and now you can do it too,” Marshall said at a news conference.

Some prison officials in other states want to take a closer look at how the process works in Alabama and whether they can replicate it in their states. Oklahoma and Mississippi already have laws authorizing the use of nitrogen in executions, and some other states, such as Nebraska, have introduced measures this year to add it as an option.

“Our intent is that if it works, it’s humane and we can do it, we certainly want to use it,” said Steven Harp, director of Oklahoma’s prison system.

After being fitted with a mask that forced him to breathe pure nitrogen, depriving him of oxygen, Smith was declared dead during his execution Thursday night at an Alabama prison, before being declared dead. Kept shivering and shivering for at least two minutes.

Alabama Corrections Commissioner John Q. Hamm described Smith’s trembling as an involuntary movement and said that nothing unusual happened in the process.

“This was all expected, and they were side effects that we had seen or investigated regarding nitrogen hypoxia (lack of oxygen),” Hamm said.

Harp and his chief of staff, Justin Farris, who rewrote Oklahoma’s lethal injection protocol after a botched execution in 2014, traveled to Alabama to watch the equipment reform officials received for nitrogen executions and study their protocols. of.

“We want to see how it works, how fast it works and how efficient it is,” Farris said. “I think the whole country in the field of correctional institutions is looking at how this is done.”

The United States has a long history of developing methods of execution that soon became widely adopted, beginning with electric shock in the early 20th century, which replaced hanging, followed by the gas chamber and Finally, lethal injection, which was developed by a doctor in Oklahoma. 1970s. Austin Serratt, a law professor at Amherst College who has written extensively on failed executions and the death penalty, said the use of nitrogen could be the next method to gain popularity.

“This is a chapter in the long history of America,” Sharat said. “Since the late 20th century, the United States has sought an execution method that would be a kind of technological magic bullet that would ensure that executions were safe, reliable, and humane.

“Why are we on that quest? Because we want the death penalty, but we want to be able to say that it’s not cruel.

Oklahoma was the first state to consider using nitrogen nearly a decade ago, following the failed execution in 2014 of Clayton Lockett, who gritted his teeth, groaned and writhed at his throat until a doctor performed the procedure on him. No problems were observed with the intravenous catheter, and the execution was suspended. Before Lockett died, 43 minutes after the procedure. Further investigation revealed that the probe had become dislocated and lethal chemicals had been pumped into the tissue surrounding the injection site, rather than into his bloodstream.

Many other states, including Alabama, have had problems administering lethal injections or obtaining lethal substances, particularly because manufacturers, many of whom are based in Europe, have objected to the drugs being used to kill people. And corrections center departments have banned their sale, or stopped manufacturing them.

According to a recent annual report, even though some death penalty states remain committed to carrying out executions, use and support for the death penalty has seen a decline that has lasted for several years, and more Americans Now think that the death penalty is given unfairly. ,

According to the Washington-based Information Center on the Death Penalty, 29 states in the United States have, in the majority, abolished the death penalty or halted executions, and only 24 executions will be scheduled in five states in the country in 2023. Went. , DC

“Since 2007, more states have abolished the death penalty than any other comparable 17-year period in American history,” Sharat said. “This national idea is driven not only by moral integrity, but also by a sense that this is a broken system.”

Ryan Kissel, a former Oklahoma legislator and civil rights attorney who opposed Oklahoma’s efforts to approve nitrogen while serving as director of the state chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, said the effort to find a new method will continue. Pressure is a futile effort by states. To purify a violent act.

“Perhaps, rather than trying to adopt increasingly accepted methods of killing a person, if a state wants to impose the death penalty, it should have a method that reflects the violent act that constitutes that execution. It is,” Kiesel said. “If we can’t afford it, we shouldn’t do it.”

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Murphy reported from Oklahoma City.