Not a fan of the death penalty in general, for multiple reasons, but anesthesia administered by gas, as before surgery, seems way more certain than searching for a vein. After that, no method of execution is going to be cruel, assuming the criminal doesn't wake up.
I believe that is wasn't unheard of in England for relatives of a condemned person to pay off the hangman to either (a) make sure the death went well (ie, they were killed by their neck being broken instead of strangulation) or (b) to cut them down early so they would survive.
I thought of the story of wenseslau moguel who was "executed" by firing squad, (including a shot to the head) but survived and crawled away from the carnage after dark.
I always thought that the movie, Capote, had the most visceral depiction of execution I've seen in film. The idea of being led to your death, the hood, the waiting for the platform to drop. Oof, makes my heart race a bit. The hanging or shooting may be quick, but the moments leading up to it certainly are not. And imagine if you were innocent!
This is one reason why, when the UK had capital punishment, a premium was placed on speed. The condemned cell was set up a few yards from the scaffold and the idea was that the time from the executioner entering the cell to the trap being dropped could be well under one minute.
The movie 'Pierrepoint' shows this pretty well (and has a very good performance by Timothy Spall as the eponymous professional but slightly conflicted hangman).
Yes, but that didn't seem always to be the case when the British were hanging people overseas. George Orwell wrote an essay, A Hanging [1], about an execution that he witnessed while serving in Burma. The prisoner, and escort, have a walk of several minutes from the cell to the gallows outdoors. At one point, with 40 yards to go to the gallows, the party is disrupted by a large playful dog. He notes that after the disturbance, the prisoner steps to one side to avoid a puddle on the ground. Orwell writes:
"It is curious, but till that moment I had never realized what it means to destroy a healthy, conscious man. When I saw the prisoner step aside to avoid the puddle, I saw the mystery, the unspeakable wrongness, of cutting a life short when it is in full tide. This man was not dying, he was alive just as we were alive. All the organs of his body were working — bowels digesting food, skin renewing itself, nails growing, tissues forming — all toiling away in solemn foolery. His nails would still be growing when he stood on the drop, when he was falling through the air with a tenth of a second to live. His eyes saw the yellow gravel and the grey walls, and his brain still remembered, foresaw, reasoned — reasoned even about puddles. He and we were a party of men walking together, seeing, hearing, feeling, understanding the same world; and in two minutes, with a sudden snap, one of us would be gone — one mind less, one world less.
It's powerful stuff, whatever your thoughts on capital punishment.
In Japan, those condemned to death are not informed of their execution date until the day it happens, and can languish in jail for decades until that day.
Imagine spending 32 years in solitary confinement, under the knowledge that the next knock on your door could be last:
Paths of Glory would like to have a word with you.
This might sound hyperbolic, but it's not only the the most visceral depiction of execution I've seen - it's simply one of the most intense moments of all cinema. It's the film that made Stanley Kubrick famous, and for a good reason. That said, I also liked Capote.
Because there are existing court rulings declaring that lethal injection (with a particular cocktail of drugs) is not considered cruel and unusual punishment. If any other method were tried the accused would appeal on the grounds that the method was excessively cruel and the court process would take many years to complete.
If you want to make that generalization, you should have some good sources to back it up. Do you have some stats saying that e.g. 99% of pro-death-penalty people want the accused to "suffer"?
Otherwise you're just throwing shade on people you disagree with, and that doesn't make you look good.
Or you know, literally, just a gun to the head. Out of all possible execution methods that were tried in the last century, the lethal injection seems to be one of the most horrific ones, possibly beaten by the electric chair.
Why not a firing squad? I’ve never understood why we are so concerned with the pain and suffering of a condemned murderer. I get that the 8th amendment is there and we shouldn’t want to make anyone suffer but some criminals are alive simply because it’s illegal to kill them.
Firing squads can still be used in Utah if the prisoner was sentenced before May 2004 and chooses for that method over lethal injection. They can also be used if lethal injection drugs aren't available.
For federal executions, the Trump DOJ changed the rules effective December 24, 2020 to allow federal executions to use any method that the state in which the prisoner was sentenced allows so federal prisoners sentenced in Utah could now be executed via firing squad.
Some prisoners choose the firing squad (possibly to protest it).
> For federal executions, the Trump DOJ changed the rules effective December 24, 2020 to allow federal executions to use any method that the state in which the prisoner was sentenced allows
Readit News
The movie 'Pierrepoint' shows this pretty well (and has a very good performance by Timothy Spall as the eponymous professional but slightly conflicted hangman).
"It is curious, but till that moment I had never realized what it means to destroy a healthy, conscious man. When I saw the prisoner step aside to avoid the puddle, I saw the mystery, the unspeakable wrongness, of cutting a life short when it is in full tide. This man was not dying, he was alive just as we were alive. All the organs of his body were working — bowels digesting food, skin renewing itself, nails growing, tissues forming — all toiling away in solemn foolery. His nails would still be growing when he stood on the drop, when he was falling through the air with a tenth of a second to live. His eyes saw the yellow gravel and the grey walls, and his brain still remembered, foresaw, reasoned — reasoned even about puddles. He and we were a party of men walking together, seeing, hearing, feeling, understanding the same world; and in two minutes, with a sudden snap, one of us would be gone — one mind less, one world less.
It's powerful stuff, whatever your thoughts on capital punishment.
[1] https://orwell.ru/library/articles/hanging/english/e_hanging
Imagine spending 32 years in solitary confinement, under the knowledge that the next knock on your door could be last:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_in_Japan
This might sound hyperbolic, but it's not only the the most visceral depiction of execution I've seen - it's simply one of the most intense moments of all cinema. It's the film that made Stanley Kubrick famous, and for a good reason. That said, I also liked Capote.
Otherwise you're just throwing shade on people you disagree with, and that doesn't make you look good.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypercapnic_alarm_response
Inert gas asphyxiation would be a more "humane" way
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inert_gas_asphyxiation
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_chamber#United_States
Deleted Comment
For federal executions, the Trump DOJ changed the rules effective December 24, 2020 to allow federal executions to use any method that the state in which the prisoner was sentenced allows so federal prisoners sentenced in Utah could now be executed via firing squad.
> For federal executions, the Trump DOJ changed the rules effective December 24, 2020 to allow federal executions to use any method that the state in which the prisoner was sentenced allows
What a legacy