Montgomery, Alaa.. A federal judge on Tuesday permanently blocked Alabama from executing a prisoner with nitrogen gas after declaring the method violated a ban on cruel and unusual punishment.
U.S. District Judge Emily C. Marks issued the decision a day after an appeals court overturned her ruling that the method was constitutional.
Marx permanently prevented the state from executing Jeffrey Lee with nitrogen gas. Lee was scheduled to be executed on Thursday in an Alabama prison.
A spokesman for Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall said the state is appealing the decision. The case is likely to end up before the US Supreme Court, which has previously allowed nitrogen executions to take place.
A spokeswoman for Lee’s legal team said they had no immediate comment.
In her 26-page ruling, Marks said litigation is a constant in death penalty cases.
“If Alabama adopted firing squad as a method of execution,” Marks wrote, “that method, too, would likely be challenged. Indeed, there is unlikely to be a method—no matter how humane—that would be immune to constitutional challenge. But the Constitution does not guarantee a painless death, and human life cannot be intentionally extinguished without some risk of pain. The court, the convict, and the state must all confront this troubling reality.”
Marks noted that the state has two other permitted methods of execution: lethal injection and the electric chair. She said Lee “is not entitled to a court order preventing the state from executing him using one of those methods.”