Alabama seeks more nitrogen executions, despite concern over the method
MONTGOMERY, Ala. — Alabama is trying to carry out another execution with nitrogen gas, months after the state did so the first to put someone to death with the previously untested method.
The attorney general’s office on Monday asked the Alabama Supreme Court to approve an execution date for Carey Dale Grayson, convicted in the 1994 murder of Vickie Deblieux in Jefferson County.
If approved, it would be the third planned execution involving nitrogen gas. The state put Kenneth Smith to death in January in the nation’s first nitrogen gas execution. Alabama has scheduled an execution for September 26 using nitrogen gas Alan Eugene Miller.
Lethal injection remains the state’s primary method of execution, but prisoners can request to be put to death with nitrogen gas or the electric chair. After using nitrogen gas to execute Smith in January, the state is beginning to search for execution dates for the dozens of inmates who requested nitrogen as their preferred method of execution.
The request comes despite ongoing controversy and lawsuits over what happened in the first execution using nitrogen.
Smith suffered convulsions similar to seizures for more than two minutes while he was strapped to the execution chamber gurney. That was followed by several minutes of gasping breathing.
Supporters expressed concern about the conduct of the execution, saying it contradicted the state’s promise of a quick and painless death. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall characterized the execution as a “textbook” and offered to help other states develop the new method.
Alabama noted in its petition to the state Supreme Court that Grayson chose nitrogen as his preferred method of execution in 2018. They wrote that Grayson’s death sentence can be carried out by the “method of execution he voluntarily chose” and that it is time to move on.
A lawyer for Grayson said more research into the method needs to be done before it is used again.
“It is disappointing that the state would want to schedule a third execution of nitrogen hypoxia before the question of whether the first torture of Kenneth Smith has been resolved,” John Palombi, an attorney with the Federal Defenders Program, wrote in an email.
While Grayson may have chosen nitrogen hypoxia more than five years ago, Palombi said, “He did not know what the procedure would be if he were forced to make this choice.”
“Now that he knows how Alabama will implement this method of execution, he has concerns that can only be resolved through a full trial as to whether this method, as Alabama chooses to implement it, is constitutional,” he added.
Grayson was one of four people accused of torturing and murdering Deblieux on February 21, 1994
Prosecutors said Deblieux, 37, was hitchhiking from Tennessee to her mother’s home in Louisiana when she was picked up by the four people. They took her to a wooded area, where she was attacked, beaten and thrown off a cliff. Prosecutors said the teens later returned to mutilate her body, stabbing her 180 times.
Grayson, along with Kenny Loggins and Trace Duncan, were all convicted and sentenced to death. However, Loggins and Duncan, who were under 18 at the time of the crime, had their death sentences revoked after the U.S. Supreme Court in 2005 banned the execution of offenders under 18 when they commit crimes. Grayson was 19.
Another teenager was sentenced to life imprisonment.
If the judges approve the execution, Alabama Governor Kay Ivey will set the exact date.