After executing death row inmate Kenneth Eugene Smith by the controversial nitrogen hypoxia method in January, Alabama legislators have introduced a bill to ban the practice entirely. Ironically, nitrogen hypoxia—in which a prisoner is killed by being forced to breathe pure nitrogen—was originally introduced in Alabama as a supposedly more humane form of execution than lethal injection.
The Alabama Legislature passed a bill allowing the state to conduct executions by nitrogen hypoxia in 2018. At the time, the execution method was completely untested—a fact that caused it to quickly become controversial at the same time as Alabama death row inmates clamored to be killed using the hypothetical technique.
