Alabama is seeking to become the first state to execute a prisoner by making him breathe pure nitrogen.
The Alabama attorney general’s office on Friday asked the state Supreme Court to set an execution date for death row inmate Kenneth Eugene Smith, 58. The court filing indicated Alabama plans to put him to death by nitrogen hypoxia, an execution method that is authorized in three states but has never been used.
Nitrogen hypoxia is caused by forcing the inmate to breathe only nitrogen, depriving them of oxygen and causing them to die. Nitrogen makes up 78% of the air inhaled by humans and is harmless when inhaled with oxygen. While proponents of the new method have theorized it would be painless, opponents have likened it to human experimentation.
That’s why I had the “and heinous actions” part. Life in prison is already a thing, we don’t execute people who got life, as you said it’s more expensive. But I suppose I could have better phrased it as “their actions were heinous enough that we don’t believe they deserve to have the right to life within our society”.
ie Justice Boner. Life in prison is already separating them from society. We just like the feeling of state mandated murdering of murderers.
It was so surprising to me when that serial baby killing nurse was in the news before her sentencing and headlines were speculating that she might get a rare life sentence (she did, she got 7 consecutive life sentences). But even through all that, the British people were commenting “I hope she gets the mental health help she needs while she’s in there” in sharp contrast to what US people usually say about hoping people suffer/are tortured/murdered in prison. Americans were voicing more gruesome hopes for Elizabeth Holmes’ prison stay than Brits did about Lucy Letby. We’re a brutal society.