Witnesses watched through a window at an Alabama prison as Kenneth Eugene Smith became the nation's first person to be put to death using nitrogen gas.

ATMORE, Ala. (AP) — As witnesses including five news reporters watched through a window, Kenneth Eugene Smith, who was convicted and sentenced to die in the 1988 murder-for hire slaying of Elizabeth Sennett, convulsed on a gurney as Alabama carried out the nation’s first execution using nitrogen gas.

  • eltrain123@lemmy.world
    22·
    8 months ago

    If you are going to execute someone with nitrogen, would it add that much cost to anesthetize them to sleep first?

    I’m not for capital punishment but realize that it’s the system we have. But slowly suffocating someone to death is surely demonstrative of the fact that it’s supposed to be torture.

    • Akasazh@feddit.nl
      17·
      8 months ago

      The most bizarre thing about the entire debate is that most proponents of the death penalty explicitly want it to be a painful experience.

      Everything pushed to make they process more effective and humane meets resistance.

      • quicklime@lemm.ee
        5·
        8 months ago

        They’re self-convinced, against nearly all studies and evidence and expert consensus, that capital punishment is an effective deterrent.

    • SoylentBlake@lemm.eeEnglish
      738·
      8 months ago

      Dude was unconscious almost immediately. His brain was dead but the body takes longer to go. The violent spasms was the unconscious and uninhabited body using the last of its energy, mechanically.

      This has been so dramatized it’s disgusting. The execution? Humane. The media around it? Must clearly want more suffering.