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Oklahoma plans to start carrying out executions with nitrogen gas, a method that has never been used in the U.S. but that some states have already approved amid difficulties with lethal injections.
At a news conference Wednesday, Oklahoma Atty. Gen. Mike Hunter and Corrections Director Joe M. Allbaugh said that over the next few months the state would develop a protocol for using nitrogen.
[...] In recent years, Oklahoma and other states have struggled to obtain the drugs needed for lethal injections, the most common execution method but one that has increasingly faced scrutiny.
In 2015, a state court put a moratorium on executions in Oklahoma after a series of botched executions, including one in which an inmate convulsed for 43 minutes before dying and another in which the wrong drug was administered.
Oklahoma is poised to become the first state to use nitrogen gas in executions
(Score: 2) by The Shire on Friday March 16 2018, @06:58AM (5 children)
CO2 would be an absolutely horrible gas to use. It is not a lack of oxygen that makes a person feel like they can't breath, it's the level of CO2. So using CO2 would be a very painful way to go - you absolutely would NOT just "go to sleep". You would choke and gasp and thrash. This is precisely why they are talking about using Nitrogen. When you displace the air with an inert gas like nitrogen or argon or helium, the body is completely unaware that it is no longer getting oxygen. In such a case you simply pass out within seconds. And since nitrogen already composes nearly 80% of the air we breath, it's the perfect gas to use. Essentially you just need a unit that removes oxygen before it enters the chamber. Quick. Quiet. Humane.
(Score: 4, Funny) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Friday March 16 2018, @09:32AM (2 children)
AAAAAAHHHHH! You mean we are all breathing execution gas all the time? EVERYBODY PANIC! BAN NITROGEN! AAAAHHHH!
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Friday March 16 2018, @01:18PM (1 child)
I've got my towel...you got yours?
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Friday March 16 2018, @06:19PM
I'm taking my chances with the Nitrogen: I've felt the damage humans can do with poetry.
(Score: 2) by zafiro17 on Friday March 16 2018, @06:52PM (1 child)
Where rapists and murderers are concerned, I am fully supportive of killing them in the same way they killed their victims, or at least causing them equal pain. That guy who raped and strangled a seven year girl ... why should I give a single shit if he thrashes and experiences pain? What about how she felt in her final moments?
For bonus points, I would film and publicize it. Youtube channel, at least. Don't want to get executed the way this guy did? Then don't do the crime.
All this concern for the welfare of criminals is inexplicable. Some of these guys I could stand to see be executed by chainsaw sodomy, and I wouldn't lose any sleep over it. Nitrogen gas, ha. How about gasoline and a match? For Youtube?
Dad always thought laughter was the best medicine, which I guess is why several of us died of tuberculosis - Jack Handey
(Score: 3, Insightful) by The Shire on Saturday March 17 2018, @02:44AM
To be honest, I think a humane death is more about us than them. We need to believe that we are not the violent ones and that it's enough to take away everything the criminal ever had, or ever will have, and to permanently remove the threat they presented to society.