In a divided decision in the Supreme Court of Alabama, the use of nitrogen gas in executions by the state will be used for the first time. According to reports, the state attorney general’s request for Kenneth Eugene Smith to be put to death was granted by the all-Republican court with a 6-2 vote. Though the execution technique was not specified in the order, documents from the attorney general of Alabama suggested that nitrogen gas would be used to carry out Smith’s death sentence.
Smith was one of two people found guilty in Colbert County, Alabama, in 1988 of Elizabeth Sennett’s contract killing.
The execution’s final date which is not yet known, will be decided by Alabama Governor Kay Ivey. Although more litigation is expected to surround this planned new method of death, this verdict moves Alabama closer to being the first state to undertake an execution using nitrogen gas.
Though it has been approved, none of the three states—Alabama, Oklahoma, and Mississippi—have used nitrogen hypoxia as an execution technique yet.
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The suggested technique is to make the prisoner breathe only nitrogen, depriving them of the oxygen required for survival and ultimately leading to their death. When combined with oxygen, nitrogen makes up 78% of the air that humans breathe and is safe to inhale. Supporters of this novel approach speculate that it would be painless, while detractors have compared it to human experimentation.