AP: Alabama has carried out its second-ever nitrogen execution despite criticism of the method
The state of Alabama has carried out the second execution by nitrogen in U.S. history, despite criticism of the method, the Associated Press, which monitored the execution, reported.
Executed was U.S. citizen Alan Eugene Miller, 59. He was sentenced to execution for the 1999 murders of three men. His last words were.
“I have done nothing to end up here,” the agency reported.
During the execution, nitrogen is pumped through a breathing mask into the condemned man, triggering hypoxia and eventual death. The state of Alabama already tried to carry out the death penalty on Miller in 2022, but medics were unable to give him a lethal injection at the time.
In January, Alabama executed 58-year-old Kenneth Eugene Smith, convicted of a contract killing in 1988, with nitrogen. At the time, the UN and the EU criticized this method of capital punishment, and the Democrat-controlled White House expressed “deep concern” about the execution in the Republican state.