Republican Lawmakers in Oklahoma Advocates for Painless Gas Execution Chamber

The Republican lawmakers in the US State of Oklahoma will meet soon to consider a bill that advocates the use of nitrogen hypoxia (a back-up method of execution) for prisoners on death roll.

Republican lawmakers have already taken a position on the bill. They are said to be pushing for the state to become the first in the US to allow the use of such nitrogen gas for execution.

Currently in Oklahoma, lethal injection is the approved method of execution. It has been used since 1990. Other options available in case the injection is declared unconstitutional by the court, the electric chair would be used. Firing squad would be the third option if the first two are stopped.

Republican lawmaker, Mike Christian is said to have introduced this new bill and he says he wants to eliminate the electrocution as a back-up method in order to replace it with the gas chamber.

“You wouldn’t need a medical doctor to do it. It’s a lot more practical. It’s efficient,” Mike Christian told the Associated Press News Agency.

He further said unlike traditional gas chambers that used drugs like cyanide, which cause a build-up of carbon dioxide in the blood, breathing nitrogen would be painless because it leads to hypoxia – a gradual lack of oxygen in the blood, similar to what can happen to pilots at higher altitudes.

Experts say execution via “nitrogen hypoxia” is a method advanced in the National Law Review paper in 2005 by Stuart A. Creque. It is seemingly based on the fatal outcomes of two chemical accidents involving nitrogen.

But despite this attempt by the Republicans in Oklahoma, human rights activists against the death penalty say the lawmakers should abolish the death roll rather than going around the circle.

Spokesman for the Oklahoma Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, Rev. Adam Leathers told the Associated Press in an interview that lawmakers should abolish the death penalty altogether, rather than spend time developing more efficient ways to kill people.

“It is evidence of what a ludicrous idea this is to begin with, we’re scrambling around trying to figure out humane ways to kill someone. There isn’t a right way to do the wrong thing “, he said.

Meanwhile, The US Supreme Court is reviewing Oklahoma’s use of lethal injection. This became necessary for the court following several botched executions. Three prisoners on death roll filed the lawsuit arguing that the method violates the constitutional ban against cruel and unusual punishment.

According to further details of their suit, the tranquilizer chemical known as midazolam, which is used as part of a three-drug injection cocktail, is not strong enough to make inmates completely unconscious and protect them from pain. The lawsuit was said to have been originally filed by four inmates, but one of the men – Charles Warner was executed on January 15 after justices voted to allow the lethal injection to proceed.

Eyewitnesses who saw Warner’s death said he declared that his “body is one fire” and that “no one should go through this” before he died. It is said the lethal injection process took more than 18 minutes to complete which means it took longer than is supposed to have taken. Witnesses added that the back of Warner’s neck twitched for about seven minutes before he died. Warner was convicted of raping and murdering an infant in 1997.

Researchers from the University of Miami in 2005 said in a report that the levels of tranquilizers in 21 out of 49 prisoners executed by lethal injection were low enough in dose that the prisoner being executed could have been conscious to the end.

Statistics from the Death Penalty Information Center shows that since 1976, just over 1,200 prisoners on death roll have been executed by lethal injection. 158 others have been electrocuted, 11 put to death in a gas chamber, 3 hanged and 3 killed by firing squad.

Lethal injection processes have seen some changes since 2010 in the United States. The lone US drug manufacturing company of sodium thiopental –Hospira stopped producing the drug due to concerns by the US’ public that it is commonly used for executions.

That drug was a tranquilizer which renders a person unconscious before the other substances that would cause the real death were administered. The State of Texas changed its lethal injection to only a single drug but other US States have been struggling to develop new lethal injection that reduces pain in execution.

Source: http://rt.com/usa/230775-oklahoma-gas-chambers-executions/