The execution comes a day after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected an effort by the convict Kenneth Eugene Smith to delay it and review his case.
Topline
Alabama executed a death row inmate using nitrogen gas Thursday, marking the first time a convict was put to death in the U.S. using a method critics have called experimental, inhumane and a potential breach of international conventions against torture.Key Facts
Kenneth Eugene Smith, 58, who had been sentenced to death for a 1988 murder, was pronounced dead at 8:25 p.m., a state corrections official said in a press conference on Thursday night.
Smith’s execution was carried out by strapping him to a gurney and using a mask that would force him to breathe nitrogen gas and deprive him of oxygen.
According to a pool of reporters who attended the execution, the Smith appeared to remain conscious for several minutes and “visibly shook and writhed against the gurney” after the gas was pumped into the mask.
