10 Arkansas death row inmates sue to stop nitrogen gas executions, 1 asks to be next

Scotty Gardner wants out of “his cave” at the Varner SuperMax Prison south of Grady, Arkansas.

In messages with USA TODAY, he described the conditions of his cell as, “a walk-in closet with a shower, toilet, a sink and drain in the floor that bugs crawl in and out constantly.” He also mentioned recurring issues with black mold and toilets that constantly overflow.

To get out, Gardner is asking the state to be the first inmate executed since 2017. 

His request is on hold as 10 death row inmates filed a lawsuit to block the implementation of nitrogen hypoxia as a means of execution, which the state’s legislature authorized earlier this year and went into effect Aug. 5.

Arkansas has not seen an execution since then-Gov. Asa Hutchinson ordered eight exe­cu­tions to be car­ried out in four sets of dou­ble exe­cu­tions over an 11-day peri­od in April, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

Here’s what you need to know about the state of the death penalty in Arkansas.

Arkansas death row inmates challenge nitrogen gas

The lawsuit, filed in Pulaski County Circuit Court on Aug. 5, argues that the law allowing for nitrogen gas executions grants the Arkansas Division of Correction “absolute, unregulated, and undefined discretion” to use the controversial execution method and retroactively applies it to previous death sentences.

“Arkansas juries explicitly sentenced our clients to execution by lethal injection – not gas – and the General Assembly cannot rewrite those verdicts to impose death by this very different and highly problematic method,” Heather Fraley, an attorney for several of the plaintiffs, said in a press release announcing the filing.

The filing further questions how the department will carry out executions with nitrogen gas.

“If the ADC chooses nitrogen, will it be administered via a mask? A hood? A gas chamber? What will the concentration of the gas be? How will ADC obtain the gas, and how will it verify its quality and composition?” the filing reads. “At what rate will the gas flow? Who will administer the gas, and how will they be trained? How long will the gas be administered?”

The nitrogen hypoxia method of execution is carried out by depriving the condemned of oxygen as the inmate inhales nitrogen through a mask and asphyxiates.

States have turned to using the method as access to the drugs needed for lethal injections has been limited in recent years.

Arkansas carried out four of the executions scheduled by Hutchinson as its supplies of the drugs used in lethal injections were set to expire, CNN reported at the time. Two of them were botched – according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

Inmate asks for state to carry out sentence

Gardner was convicted of the 2016 murder of his then-girlfriend Heather Stubbs, a crime he admitted to in court filings and the message exchange with USA TODAY.

A handwritten filing made by Gardner in 2020 asked the Arkansas State Supreme Court to order his sentence and stated that he would accept forms of execution that included the firing squad and the electric chair. A 2025 filing from Gardner reads, “set a date and let’s do it.”

“Why die of old age in a one-man cave 20 years from now when I can be forthcoming and say Hey, let’s do this,” Gardner wrote in the messages to USA TODAY.

Gardner’s spiritual advisor, the Rev. Jeff Hood, recognized the conflict between advocating for what one of “my guys” wants and what he views as “insane explosions of moral suicide” in an interview with USA TODAY.

“You can hate the method while loving the person the method is being used against,” Hood said. “To support someone in their bodily autonomy is divine.”

Hood, who is also an anti-death penalty advocate, witnessed the first nitrogen gas execution in U.S. history and testified against his home state adopting it.

Hood said that the conditions at Varner, which he called “the worst of any death row in the nation,” play a part in why Gardner has been asking for the death sentence to be carried out.

“You don’t expect death row to be a five-star resort, right? But, you also don’t expect death row to be fatal until it’s time to carry out the execution,” Hood said.

Two Arkansas death row inmates dead in 2025, neither executed

Two death row inmates in Arkansas have died so far in 2025, despite the state not carrying out executions.

Bruce Ward, 68, died at Varner in April, having been the longest-serving person on death row before his death. Latavious Johnson, 43, died at the prison in June.

The Arkansas Department of Corrections cited natural causes in a media advisory for Ward’s death, while it did not provide a cause of death in Johnson’s media advisory.

The department declined to comment when asked by USA TODAY.

Hood blamed the conditions on death row for the deaths.

“They’re receiving substandard health care, substandard meals, substandard everything. And you know, their treatment in comparison to guys on death row again around the nation, it’s not just substandard, it’s deadly,” Hood said.

Source: USA Today, Staff, August 14, 2025

"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted."

— Oscar Wilde