An Alabama death row inmate will be the first inmate ever to be executed using nitrogen gas instead of the lethal injection Thursday night.
58-year-old Kenneth Eugene Smith is set to be executed by the never-before-used method at a South Alabama prison.
An attempted lethal injection execution on Smith failed in 2022 after officials couldn’t connect an IV line to administer the drugs.
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Authorities plan to place a respirator mask over Smith’s face and then replace his oxygen with nitrogen gas.
Smith was convicted of the murder-for-hire killing of Elizabeth Sennett in 1988. His attorneys opposed his nitrogen-gas execution calling it a “test case” for the method.
“It’s an experiment,” said Smith’s spiritual advisor the Rev. Jeff Hood.
