Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed legislation on Tuesday to allow executions using nitrogen gas, which made Arkansas the fifth state to adopt a method that according to opponents is unconstitutional.
The measure signed by the Republican Governor was promoted by supporters as a way to carry out executions for the first time in eight years. Arkansas currently has 25 people on Death Row.
Arkansas has not had an execution since 2017, when it killed four people before a sedative used in the deadly injection protocol expired. The Attorney General’s office said the state could no longer buy deadly injection medicine due to the opposition of the manufacturers against its use.
According to the nitrogen hypoxia performance method, a prisoner is forced to catch up and deprive the gas and deprive the oxygen needed to stay alive. Alabama, the first state to use nitrogen gas, has performed four executions using the method since it started last year.
Three other states – Louisiana, Mississippi and Oklahoma – have laws that allow it, but have not used the method so far. A Federal Appeal Court said on Friday that Louisiana could perform its first nitrogen gas performance, which is planned on Tuesday.
Opponents say the method increases the suffering, referring to accounts of witnesses to Alabama’s executions that said prisoners were shaking and shaking during executions. Public servants believe these are involuntary movements associated with oxygen deficiency.
Arkansas has expanded the secrecy around the execution process over the past few years and issued laws that envelop the source of deadly injection medicine and other details. Critics are concerned that the state is not expected to disclose the type or source of nitrogen gas it would use.
The Act comes into effect 90 days after the legislature adjourned, which will occur as early as possible.
