Nine months after Kenneth Smith’s botched lethal injection, state attorney general has asked for approval to kill him with nitrogen
It’s hardly an experiment if you know the results.
But by that definition, every method was “experimental” at some point. Lethal injection, firing squad, electric chair, gas chamber, hanging, the guillotine, the breaking wheel, being drawn and quartered, scaphism, whatever method had to be done for the first time once. And I would take nitrogen asphyxiation over any of those. Hell, when I start suffering, I sincerely hope that option is available to me so I can go out on my own terms.
Yes. It’s true that every technology was once experimental. But how experiments are done is important. And I certainly hope we’ve moved forward morally since we started executing people. We’re supposed to learn from our mistakes, not use them to justify future ones.
The prisoner volunteered. I’m not sure what better circumstances we could get.
I really think death penalty opponents just don’t want to break the seal. Right now the idea that it’s “experimental” is the only argument against it. Prove it works, and it will quickly become the go-to method.
Opposition got their biggest victory when they got drug companies to stop providing the traditional 3 drug cocktail that has worked for decades. Now they argue every other method is either cruel and unusual (new drugs or older methods) our too experimental (inert gas asphyxiation or opioid overdose) when those latter methods are likely far more humane and much harder to stop up the supply.
