Montgomery, Alaa.. Alabama’s use of nitrogen gas to execute people needs further study on whether it violates the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment, a federal appeals court decided Monday.
State first Use of nitrogen for the death penalty in 2024The ruling could overturn a death sentence scheduled in Alabama on Thursday. The method involves attaching a respirator to a person’s face and replacing breathable air with pure nitrogen, causing death due to lack of oxygen.
A three-judge panel on Monday night overruled A.J The judge’s finding in May The nitrogen method did not violate the U.S. Constitution’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment and he remanded the case for further study. The ruling came in a lawsuit filed last year by Jeffrey Lee, a man on death row It is scheduled He is scheduled to be executed by nitrogen on Thursday at a south Alabama prison.
The committee stopped short of halting Lee’s planned execution. However, the panel asked the judge to consider whether his proposed option of execution by firing squad was feasible.
The U.S. Supreme Court requires a two-pronged test for people challenging the constitutionality of an execution method. They must show that the method provides a significant risk of excess pain and that a possible alternative method is available. The appeals court said Lee met the first test but sent him back to the trial court for consideration of the second test.
The appeals panel raised concerns about the nitrogen method and how long it might take for a person to lose consciousness.
“In our view, the extensive suffering described by the district court, lasting one to three minutes, presents a significant risk of serious harm beyond death itself,” the panel wrote. “Counting to 60 or 180 seconds is not a quick exercise, and constitutionally, this time frame is intolerable given the suffering that would likely occur under Alabama’s nitrogen hypoxia protocol.”
The Alabama Attorney General’s Office did not immediately provide comment on the decision. The state has maintained that the method is constitutional.
Opponents of this method cheered the decision.
“For the first time, the court is recognizing what I and many others have seen with our own eyes. Nitrogen executions are a unique form of horror,” said the Rev. Jeff Hood, who was spiritual advisor at two nitrogen executions.
Nitrogen has been used in eight executions nationally, seven times in Alabama and once in Louisiana. Lee’s lawyers said it causes excessive suffering. The last nitrogen culling in Alabama took more than 30 minutes.
Lee was convicted of two counts of capital murder for the deaths of Jimmy Ellis and Elaine Thompson during a pawn shop robbery on Dec. 12, 1998. Prosecutors said Lee entered Jimmy’s pawn shop with a sawed-off shotgun and shot Ellis, the store owner, and Thompson, the store employee.
The jury voted 7 to 5 that Lee should be sentenced to life in prison. However, the judge overrode that recommendation and sentenced Lee to death. Alabama in 2017 He ended the practice Judicial override The judge is no longer allowed to ignore the jury’s decision to render a verdict in death penalty cases.
The ruling came several hours after a vigil was held at the Alabama Capitol urging the governor to commute Lee’s sentence to life in prison.
Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall said he opposes the clemency request.
“The people of Alabama have not forgotten Jimmy and Elaine. I have not forgotten them,” Marshall said. “Anything short of implementing the court’s sentence does not bring justice to the victims, and that is not what the victims of this country deserve.”