The U.S. Supreme Court Sinks to a New Low

Trump's Supreme is permitting the state of Alabama to execute a man using a method that is considered too cruel to use on animals.  The fact that the Supreme Court considers criminals to be less than animals shouldn't come as a surprise, as they subjugated women two years ago when they denied them the basic human right to control their own bodies.

Tonight, Alabama will execute a killer by suffocating him to death with nitrogen, an experimental method that vets have deemed too cruel for most animals and has been likened to torture by the United Nations. 58-year-old Kenneth Eugene Smith will become the first person in the U.S. (and possibly the world) to be executed by nitrogen hypoxia after his appeal that it was untested and could lead to a cruel death was rejected by the courts. 

He has spent more than three decades on death row over a 1989 murder-for-hire plot, and last year survived a botched attempt to kill him by lethal injection after bungling orderlies at Holman Prison in Atmore spent 90 minutes trying to find a vein before the execution warrant expired. 

Smith will be taken from his holding cell and strapped to the same gurney on which he survived the lethal injection attempt, before he is given the chance to make a final statement to his family and that of his victim.  A curtain will then be pulled back over the small window in front of the viewing area before an industrial-style respirator mask is fitted to his face and pure nitrogen pumped through it for at least 15 minutes - causing him to die from a lack of oxygen. 

It will be the first attempt to use a new execution method since the 1982 introduction of lethal injection. Vets have ruled out nitrogen as a method of euthanasia for most animals other than pigs over fears it may cause them to suffer unnecessarily and risk the health of others in the same room.  

Attorneys for Smith have waged a legal battle to halt the second attempt to kill him, arguing the state is seeking to make Smith the 'test case' for the new method, which they argue violates the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

Smith's initial 1989 conviction was overturned on appeal, but he was retried and convicted again in 1996.  The jury recommended a life sentence by a vote of 11-1, but a judge overrode that and sentenced him to death. Alabama no longer lets judges override jury decisions in death penalty cases.  John Forrest Parker, the other man convicted in the slaying, was executed in 2010.

Some states are looking for new ways to execute inmates because the drugs used in lethal injections, the most common execution method in the United States, are increasingly difficult to find. 

Three states - Alabama, Mississippi and Oklahoma - have authorized nitrogen hypoxia as an execution method, but no state has attempted to use the untested method until now. The state has predicted the nitrogen gas will cause unconsciousness within seconds and death within minutes.  But doctors and rights organizations have raised alarm about the state's plan.  The experimental method is so grim that the American Veterinary Medical Association ruled it was too 'distressing' to be used when euthanizing animals in 2000. 

Experts appointed by the United Nations Human Rights Council cautioned they believe the execution method could violate the prohibition on torture.  Much of what is known about death by nitrogen gas comes from industrial accidents or suicide attempts. Dr. Philip Nitschke, a euthanasia expert who designed a suicide pod using nitrogen gas and appeared as an expert witness for Smith, said nitrogen can provide a peaceful, hypoxic death, but said he has concerns about Alabama's proposal to use a mask.   Nitschke said that Smith's facial hair, jaw movements and involuntary movements as he feels the effect of the nitrogen could impact the seal.   If there are leaks, Smith could continue to draw in enough oxygen, 'to prolong into what could be a very rather macabre, slow process of slowly not getting enough oxygen,' Nitschke said.  He said he could envision scenarios where the execution goes quickly or seriously awry.  

Robert Grass, an attorney for Smith, told federal courts that they are challenging the specific way the state plans to administer the nitrogen.  They argued the use of a gas mask puts Smith at risk for a prolonged and painful death or choking to death on his own vomit.   Rev. Jeff Hood, Smith's spiritual confidante, told the Times he expects he will thrash against the gurney.  'This is not going to be a peaceful experiment. I think it's important for people to realize, when you strap someone down like that, you can't expect someone who's choking to death — suffocating to death — to not resist,' he said. 

Meanwhile, a Catholic priest set to enter the execution chamber to accompany Smith during his final moments fears he could be put at risk by the new technique.  The Reverend Jeff Hood told the WFSA: ''We are being exposed to nitrogen gas in a way that nobody in human history has ever been exposed to nitrogen gas.  It's a scary thing, there is no doubt about that. But it's not scary enough to make me turn away from what god has called me to do."