RICHMOND — Virginia lawmakers, facing a shortage of the drugs used to perform lethal injections, are moving toward re-embracing use of the electric chair.
The House of Delegates overwhelmingly passed a bill Wednesday that would make electrocution the default method of death for condemned prisoners if lethal injection is not available. Currently, electrocution is used only at the request of the inmate sentenced to die.
Virginia, like other states that allow capital punishment, is struggling with a shortage of the drugs used to execute prisoners. European manufacturers will not sell chemicals for use in executions, and a major U.S. supplier halted production in 2011.
Only six states — Alabama, Florida, Kentucky, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia — still authorize use of the electric chair, according to research compiled by the Death Penalty Information Center. And Kentucky and Tennessee permit electrocution only for crimes committed before 1998. All of the six states will electrocute only those inmates who specifically request it.
A Senate version of the bill is in committee.
The big question, to me, is why we are reliant on European manufacturers to provide chemicals to execute? Every day in veterinary clinics across Americans, people have their pets put down. The animal is quietly “put so sleep’ without pain, or so we are told.
Why isn’t this done to those who are to be executed? Have we all been lied to? Is Fido’s death really painless and peaceful or is there something else going on? Why are prisoners who have been condemned to death not subjected to the same level of decency, if we can call execution ‘decent?’?
This seems like a simple task. Is there a magic formula? Why aren’t American drug companies capable of making a product that can be used to ‘put people to sleep?’
Electrocution is horrible and barbaric. “Old Sparky” needs to become a museum piece. Find a better way, Virginia. Find a better way.
I would think hangings or firing squads would be cheaper and more humane. (for that matter, so would the by-gone Indian practice of having an elephant step on the condemned man’s head – not sure how many underemployed elephants we have in Virginia, but it might convince the PETA people that we are trying to even things out). Electrocution has to be one of the most barbaric recent additions to Man’s impressive ability to think of clever ways to kill condemned criminals.
I guess the good news here is that our legislature is beginning to think ahead and to anticipate problems before they are hard upon us. It’s the vision thing (along with LaRock’s effort to make sure we can have bazookas).
What is this about bazookas?
I don’t see why humans can’t be given the same injections animals are given. Those seem humane enough. What do they use in Holland for end of life decisions?
There are lots of drugs that can “put people to sleep” but as we already know, some pharmaceutical companies refuse to sell those drugs if they are to be used for executions. Any large enough dose of things such as sodium thiopental or pentobarbital (most often used for dogs and cats) will “put people to sleep”. In the case of Old Yeller, it doesn’t take much to do the job but in the case of people or large animals, much more is required–a matter of size is part of it. Barbituates are commonly used in the Netherlands along with drugs to “relax” the patient.
Although Utah banned execution by firing squad in 2004, but because the law is not retroactive, three inmates on Utah’s death row could still opt for execution by firing squad. The last firing squad execution in Utah was in 2010. My home state of Oklahoma still has use of a firing squad as a secondary method of execution.
Perhaps the most efficient form of execution is the coup de grâce–one shot to the back of the head. Efficient but may required a closed casket funeral.
The bazooka reference was to Mr. LaRock’s proposal in the General Assembly to liberalize restrictions on anti-tank weapon ownership. I appreciate the problem. Hardly a day goes by that I would not have had a better standard of life if I had been able to own and carry a bazooka.
@Scout
LOL, please tell me you are kidding about Mr. LaRock. Has he ever held office before? Is that the dude who came on someone’s private property and tore down a sign advertising their adult store?
Two more dustups over executions–one in Missouri and another in Ohio–about the drug(s) being used. SCOTUS has turned down the Ohio case where the man to be executed is “afraid” of the drug. So, maybe “Old Sparky” or something else may come along. But there are plenty of drugs that can do the trick. At one time when there was a cocktail of three drugs I think curare or a similar paralytic was one of them–it paralyzed the breathing mechanism but came after the prisoner was unconscious.
This seems like such a simple solution. How do people do the death with dignity thing in Oregon?
I think that we either hang up pretending we are humane and if we are sure we have the right person, just go all animal on the person (if and only if we have DNA etc beyond a shadow of a doubt) or we just start putting people to sleep like we do our beloved dogs and cats.
It seems to me that the real question becomes, did the person really commit some heinous crime. Every week, somewhere in the USA, we hear about someone who is released because they were falsely imprisoned.