After Alabama approved nitrogen hypoxia as an execution method last year, the biggest challenge seemed to be figuring out how to humanely carry out the death penalty with a never before used method of execution.
But another hurdle may loom for Alabama as Oklahoma — the first state to approve nitrogen as an execution method — struggles to obtain the equipment necessary to deliver the gas.
Matt Elliott, spokesman for the Oklahoma Department of Corrections, said attempts to purchase a gas delivery device have thus far been unsuccessful due to companies' fears of being associated with the death penalty.
“There are some things out there that would perform the role we would need them to, but the manufacturers don’t want to sell them to us, because they don’t want the negative attention from the advocates and people who are against the death penalty,” Elliott said in a phone interview with the Montgomery Advertiser.
Alabama and Oklahoma are two of only three states that have passed legislation allowing executions by nitrogen, with Mississippi being the third. No state or country has used nitrogen in an execution.
The Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC) and attorney general's office are responsible for implementing nitrogen hypoxia as a death penalty option.
ADOC spokesperson Bob Horton said 51 of the state's 171 death row inmates have requested death by nitrogen. But no procedure has been developed and Horton said, "There has been no attempt to purchase equipment to carry out executions by nitrogen."
The attorney general's office declined to comment.
Nitrogen makes up 78 percent of the atmosphere and is harmless when inhaled with oxygen. However, when pure nitrogen is inhaled quickly and in large quantities, the inert gas displaces oxygen within the body or room leading to unconsciousness and what many believe to be a painless death.
Former Sen. Trip Pittman, R-Montrose, pushed the bill to allow death by nitrogen last year as a "more humane" option in the wake of several botched executions by lethal injection.
Media witnesses to Alabama's execution of Ronald Bert Smith in December 2016 said Smith gasped and coughed for 13 minutes after receiving Midazolam, a drug meant to sedate Smith prior to the lethal injection. The execution took 34 minutes.
During his execution in October 2017, Torrey McNabb, convicted of the 1997 murder of a Montgomery police officer, lifted his arm off a gurney and grimaced about 20 minutes into the procedure.
Pittman also cited former death row inmate Thomas Arthur as a reason for the bill. Arthur escaped execution seven times amid concerns that Alabama's lethal injection cocktail caused "cruel and unusual" pain. He was executed with the three-drug cocktail in May 2017.
Nitrogen is also more easily accessible than lethal injection drugs, which at times have been difficult to obtain as many manufacturers have withdrawn drugs used in executions.
However, opponents have questioned the use of an untested method. Sen. Vivian Figures called it "an experiment" during last year's session.
The 2007 Guidelines on Euthanasia by the American Veterinary Medical Association cited a study that found dogs became unconscious within 76 seconds in an almost completely nitrogen-rich environment. Although investigators concluded the method "induced death without pain" the AVMA said "following loss of consciousness, vocalization, gasping, convulsions, and muscular tremors developed in some dogs" and only recommended the use of nitrogen hypoxia on small creatures like birds.
A 2003 study by the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board found that 80 people died from incidentally inhaling pure nitrogen between 1992 and 2002.
Nitrogen — along with helium, another potentially lethal inert gas — is also recommended as a method of suicide by "right-to-die" organizations such as the Final Exit Network (FEN).
In a study of nitrogen-caused deaths completed for Oklahoma during its death penalty discussions, FEN President Jim Chastain was quoted as saying the deaths by helium he has observed have been a "peaceful process" with no "gagging or gasping."
Pittman's bill did not specify whether the gas would be delivered via a mask or a chamber.
Likewise, Elliot would not disclose what equipment the Oklahoma Department of Corrections was attempting to procure. Only that they were having a difficult time doing so.
"We’re still at the point where we’re trying to acquire the technology to accomplish what we need to accomplish. At that point then the protocol and everything comes along with that. There’s no protocol that exists or has been established," Elliot said. "It’s one of those things we’re still working on, and it’s an untried method."
Source: montgomeryadvertiser.com, Andrew J. Yawn, February 22, 2019
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