An Alabama inmate would be the test subject for the “experimental” execution method of nitrogen hypoxia, his lawyers argued, as they asked judges to deny the state’s request to carry out his death sentence using the new method.

In a Friday court filing, attorneys for Kenneth Eugene Smith asked the Alabama Supreme Court to reject the state attorney general’s request to set an execution date for Smith using the proposed new execution method. Nitrogen gas is authorized as an execution method in three states but it has never been used to put an inmate to death.

Smith’s attorneys argued the state has disclosed little information about how nitrogen executions would work, releasing only a redacted copy of the proposed protocol.

  • butterflyattack@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    I agree that there are some crimes so horrible that the offenders no longer deserve to live. The trouble is that I don’t trust police and the courts to correctly identify the guilty all of the time. Until there’s a system that can prove guilt with 100% accuracy we shouldn’t have a death penalty.

    • Zealousideal_Fox900@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      Yeah. Look at I think it was either south korea or taiwan but one of them went and grabbed a dude for murder and then killed him, came out a few months later he was nowhere fucking near the crime and was completely innocent. They grabbed another dude and did the same. Wrong. Again. They never even found the actual killer.