Methods of Execution

Until the 1890s, hang­ing was the pri­ma­ry method of exe­cu­tion used in the United States. Hanging was still autho­rized in Delaware and Washington when courts in those states struck down the death penal­ty, although both had lethal injec­tion as a pri­ma­ry method of exe­cu­tion. The last hang­ing to take place was January 25, 1996 in Delaware.

For exe­cu­tion by this method, the inmate may be weighed the day before the exe­cu­tion, and a rehearsal is done using a sand­bag of the same weight as the pris­on­er. This is to deter­mine the length of ​‘drop’ nec­es­sary to ensure a quick death. If the rope is too long, the inmate could be decap­i­tat­ed, and if it is too short, the stran­gu­la­tion could take as long as 45 min­utes. The rope, which should be 3/​4‑inch to 1 1/​4‑inch in diam­e­ter, must be boiled and stretched to elim­i­nate spring or coil­ing. The knot should be lubri­cat­ed with wax or soap ​“to ensure a smooth slid­ing action,” accord­ing to the 1969 U.S. Army man­u­al. (The Corrections Professional, 1996 and Hillman, 1992)

Immediately before the exe­cu­tion, the pris­on­er’s hands and legs are secured, he or she is blind­fold­ed, and the noose is placed around the neck, with the knot behind the left ear. The exe­cu­tion takes place when a trap-door is opened and the pris­on­er falls through. The pris­on­er’s weight should cause a rapid frac­ture-dis­lo­ca­tion of the neck. However, instan­ta­neous death rarely occurs. (Weisberg, 1991)

If the inmate has strong neck mus­cles, is very light, if the ​‘drop’ is too short, or the noose has been wrong­ly posi­tioned, the frac­ture-dis­lo­ca­tion is not rapid and death results from slow asphyx­i­a­tion. If this occurs the face becomes engorged, the tongue pro­trudes, the eyes pop, the body defe­cates, and vio­lent move­ments of the limbs occur. (The Corrections Professional, 1996 and Weisberg, 1991)

Firing squad still remains as a method of exe­cu­tion in four states if lethal injec­tion can­not be per­formed. The most recent exe­cu­tion by this method was that of Ronnie Gardner. By his own choos­ing, Gardner was exe­cut­ed by fir­ing squad in Utah on June 17, 2010.

For exe­cu­tion by this method, the pris­on­er is typ­i­cal­ly bound to a chair with leather straps across his waist and head, in front of an oval-shaped can­vas wall. The chair is sur­round­ed by sand­bags to absorb the inmate’s blood. A black hood is pulled over the inmate’s head. A doc­tor locates the inmate’s heart with a stetho­scope and pins a cir­cu­lar white cloth tar­get over it. Standing in an enclo­sure 20 feet away, five shoot­ers are armed with .30 cal­iber rifles loaded with sin­gle rounds. One of the shoot­ers is giv­en blank rounds. Each of the shoot­ers aims his rifle through a slot in a can­vas between them and the pris­on­er and fires at the pris­on­er. (Weisberg, 1991)

The pris­on­er dies as a result of blood loss caused by rup­ture of the heart or a large blood ves­sel, or tear­ing of the lungs. The per­son shot los­es con­scious­ness when shock caus­es a fall in the sup­ply of blood to the brain. If the shoot­ers miss the heart, by acci­dent or inten­tion, the pris­on­er bleeds to death slow­ly. (Hillman, 1992 and Weisberg, 1991)

Seeking a more humane method of exe­cu­tion than hang­ing, New York built the first elec­tric chair in 1888 and exe­cut­ed William Kemmler in 1890. Soon, oth­er states adopt­ed this exe­cu­tion method. Today, elec­tro­cu­tion is not used as the sole method of exe­cu­tion in any state, though some states retain it if the inmate choos­es it or if lethal injec­tion can­not be performed.

For exe­cu­tion by the elec­tric chair, the per­son is usu­al­ly shaved and strapped to a chair with belts that cross his chest, groin, legs, and arms. A met­al skull­cap-shaped elec­trode is attached to the scalp and fore­head over a sponge moist­ened with saline. The sponge must not be too wet or the saline short-cir­cuits the elec­tric cur­rent, and not too dry, as it would then have a very high resis­tance. An addi­tion­al elec­trode is moist­ened with con­duc­tive jel­ly (Electro-Creme) and attached to a por­tion of the pris­on­er’s leg that has been shaved to reduce resis­tance to elec­tric­i­ty. The pris­on­er is then blind­fold­ed. (Hillman, 1992 and Weisberg, 1991)

After the exe­cu­tion team has with­drawn to the obser­va­tion room, the war­den sig­nals the exe­cu­tion­er, who pulls a han­dle to con­nect the pow­er sup­ply. A jolt of between 500 and 2000 volts, which lasts for about 30 sec­onds, is giv­en. The cur­rent surges and is then turned off, at which time the body is seen to relax. The doc­tors wait a few sec­onds for the body to cool down and then check to see if the inmate’s heart is still beat­ing. If it is, anoth­er jolt is applied. This process con­tin­ues until the pris­on­er is dead. The pris­on­er’s hands often grip the chair and there may be vio­lent move­ment of the limbs which can result in dis­lo­ca­tion or frac­tures. The tis­sues swell. Defecation occurs. Steam or smoke ris­es and there is a smell of burn­ing. (Hillman, 1992 and Weisberg, 1991)

U.S. Supreme Court Justice William Brennan once offered the fol­low­ing descrip­tion of an exe­cu­tion by electric chair:

…the pris­on­er’s eye­balls some­times pop out and rest on [his] cheeks. The pris­on­er often defe­cates, uri­nates, and vom­its blood and drool. The body turns bright red as its tem­per­a­ture ris­es, and the pris­on­er’s flesh swells and his skin stretch­es to the point of break­ing. Sometimes the pris­on­er catch­es fire.…Witnesses hear a loud and sus­tained sound like bacon fry­ing, and the sick­ly sweet smell of burn­ing flesh per­me­ates the cham­ber. (Ecenbarger, 1994)

At post­mortem, the body is hot enough to blis­ter if touched, and the autop­sy is delayed while the inter­nal organs cool. There are third degree burns with black­en­ing where the elec­trodes met the skin of the scalp and legs. According to Robert H. Kirschner, the deputy chief med­ical exam­in­er of Cook County, ​“The brain appears cooked in most cas­es.” (Weisberg, 1991)

In 1924, the use of cyanide gas was intro­duced as Nevada sought a more humane way of exe­cut­ing its inmates. Gee Jon was the first per­son exe­cut­ed by lethal gas. The state tried to pump cyanide gas into Jon’s cell while he slept. This proved impos­si­ble because the gas leaked from his cell, so the gas cham­ber was con­struct­ed. (Bohm, 1999) A fed­er­al court in California found this method to be cru­el and unusu­al pun­ish­ment in 1994, forc­ing the state to switch to lethal injec­tion exe­cu­tions. The last use of a gas cham­ber was on March 3, 1999, when Walter LaGrand, a German nation­al, was exe­cut­ed in Arizona. Today, eleven states autho­rize lethal gas as a method of exe­cu­tion, but all have lethal injec­tion as their pri­ma­ry method. Three of those eleven states autho­rize exe­cu­tion by nitro­gen hypox­ia, in which a pris­on­er is suf­fo­cat­ed by breath­ing pure nitro­gen, but no one has been exe­cut­ed by nitro­gen hypox­ia as of 2022. 

For exe­cu­tion by cyanide gas method, the con­demned per­son is strapped to a chair in an air­tight cham­ber. Below the chair rests a pail of sul­fu­ric acid. A long stetho­scope is typ­i­cal­ly affixed to the inmate so that a doc­tor out­side the cham­ber can pro­nounce death. Once every­one has left the cham­ber, the room is sealed. The war­den then gives a sig­nal to the exe­cu­tion­er who flicks a lever that releas­es crys­tals of sodi­um cyanide into the pail. This caus­es a chem­i­cal reac­tion that releas­es hydro­gen cyanide gas. (Weisberg, 1991)

The pris­on­er is instruct­ed to breathe deeply to speed up the process. Most pris­on­ers, how­ev­er, try to hold their breath, and some strug­gle. The pris­on­er does not lose con­scious­ness imme­di­ate­ly. According to for­mer San Quentin, California, Penitentiary war­den, Clifton Duffy, ​“At first there is evi­dence of extreme hor­ror, pain, and stran­gling. The eyes pop. The skin turns pur­ple and the vic­tim begins to drool” (Weisberg, 1991).

Caryl Chessman, before he died in California’s gas cham­ber in 1960, told reporters that he would nod his head if it hurt. Witnesses said he nod­ded his head for sev­er­al min­utes (Ecenbarger, 1994). According to Dr. Richard Traystman of John Hopkins University School of Medicine, ​“The per­son is unques­tion­ably expe­ri­enc­ing pain and extreme anxiety…The sen­sa­tion is sim­i­lar to the pain felt by a per­son dur­ing a heart attack, where essen­tial­ly the heart is being deprived of oxy­gen.” The pris­on­er dies from hypox­ia, the cut­ting-off of oxy­gen to the brain (Weisberg, 1991).

At post­mortem, an exhaust fan sucks the poi­son air out of the cham­ber, and the corpse is sprayed with ammo­nia to neu­tral­ize any remain­ing traces of cyanide. About half an hour lat­er, order­lies enter the cham­ber, wear­ing gas masks and rub­ber gloves. Their train­ing man­u­al advis­es them to ruf­fle the vic­tim’s hair to release any trapped cyanide gas before remov­ing the deceased (Weisberg, 1991).

In 2015, Oklahoma became the first state to adopt the use of nitro­gen gas in exe­cu­tions if lethal injec­tion can­not be per­formed. Though not poi­so­nous, in a closed envi­ron­ment the nitro­gen would deprive the inmate of oxy­gen, caus­ing death. It has nev­er been used in an execution.

In 1977, Oklahoma became the first state to adopt lethal injec­tion as a means of exe­cu­tion, though it would be five more years until Charles Brooks would become the first per­son exe­cut­ed by lethal injec­tion in Texas on December 7, 1982. Today, all of the states that have the death penal­ty use this method.

The con­demned per­son is usu­al­ly bound to a gur­ney and a mem­ber of the exe­cu­tion team posi­tions sev­er­al heart mon­i­tors on his skin. Two nee­dles (one is a back-up) are then insert­ed into usable veins, usu­al­ly in the pris­on­er’s arms. Long tubes con­nect the nee­dle through a hole in a cement block wall to sev­er­al intra­venous drips. The first is a harm­less saline solu­tion that is start­ed imme­di­ate­ly. Then, at the war­den’s sig­nal, a cur­tain is raised expos­ing the inmate to the wit­ness­es in an adjoin­ing room. Most exe­cu­tions by lethal-injec­tion have used a three-drug pro­to­col. First, an anes­thet­ic is admin­is­tered, which puts the inmate to sleep. Next flows pavu­lon or pan­curo­ni­um bro­mide, which par­a­lyzes the entire mus­cle sys­tem and stops the inmate’s breath­ing. Finally, the flow of potas­si­um chlo­ride stops the heart. Death results from anes­thet­ic over­dose and res­pi­ra­to­ry and car­diac arrest while the con­demned per­son is uncon­scious. (Ecenbarger, 1994 and Weisberg, 1991)

Medical ethics dis­cour­age doc­tors from par­tic­i­pat­ing in exe­cu­tions. However, a doc­tor some­times will cer­ti­fy the inmate is dead. This lack of med­ical par­tic­i­pa­tion can be prob­lem­at­ic because often injec­tions are per­formed by inex­pe­ri­enced tech­ni­cians or order­lies. If a mem­ber of the exe­cu­tion team injects the drugs into a mus­cle instead of a vein, or if the nee­dle becomes clogged, extreme pain can result. Many pris­on­ers have dam­aged veins result­ing from intra­venous drug use and it is some­times dif­fi­cult to find a usable vein, result­ing in long delays while the inmate remains strapped to the gur­ney. (Ecenbarger, 1994 and Weisberg, 1991)

Due to reser­va­tions about their prod­ucts being used in exe­cu­tions, many drug man­u­fac­tur­ers have stopped sell­ing drugs for exe­cu­tions. Recent short­ages of the drugs used in exe­cu­tions have led to many changes in lethal injec­tion pro­ce­dures. Some states now use only one drug (typ­i­cal­ly pen­to­bar­bi­tal), some use mida­zo­lam, a seda­tive, in place of the anes­thet­ic in a 3‑drug cock­tail, and some states have stopped exe­cu­tions alto­geth­er as they search for a suitable method.