Why not hanging for carrying out the death penalty?

Myriad said:
What others said about hanging.

It's not difficult finding ways of execution where cessation of conscious thought is instantaneous. How about the kind of bolt gun used to routinely and reliably slaughter cattle by the millions? Or if that's not decisive enough, a Claymore to the back of the head? The issue is more about appearances and sensibilities. Apparently the powers that be want neither rapid methods in which the damage being done is shockingly visible, nor slow methods that leave a perfectly intact corpse but cause protracted suffering. Hanging, like (as we've learned) lethal injection, fails somewhat (and sometimes, when things go wrong, quite a lot) in both respects.
Industrial accidents appear to demonstrate that nitrogen asphyxiation causes immediate loss of consciousness and rapid death thereafter. Unlike drowning in water, there's no reflex to hold one's breath, which is one of the things that makes it so dangerous in accident situations. In practice, though, unlike in accidents the victim will almost certainly be aware when the next exhalation will end their life, and so will hold their breath for as long as possible, which I suspect will make the process less placid than its proponents are hoping.
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It can't be the rare failure - as you say that happens with the current methods as well.

It just seemed very strange to me that hanging doesn't even seem to be considered yet they try and invent all new methods of execution.
 
Ryan O'Dine said:
It's gruesome looking and, as Lplus says, it's got a loaded history. Haven't bothered to look at the numbers, but I'm guessing most people on death row are Black. Hanging a lot of Black men in the U.S. -- probably mostly in the south -- is not a good look.
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That could indeed be the cause of this apparent blind spot.
 
The lawyers want to stop the execution, arguing that if something goes wrong, he might ....asphyxiate.

So what happens if it goes right?
 
Darat said:
Did wonder about putting guillotined in with hanging - then decided not as I could understand that given it is relatively messy that could be the reason it hasn't been adopted. But it is another pretty surefire way of killing someone quickly - if not instantaneously....
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There's less that can go wrong though, and it's also much simpler to set up once you build the contraption. No actual expertise required. Afterwards, you can just hose it down.

Honestly, if anyone is squeamish about the beheading and the blood they might want to reconsider the killing.
 
Myriad said:
What others said about hanging.

It's not difficult finding ways of execution where cessation of conscious thought is instantaneous. How about the kind of bolt gun used to routinely and reliably slaughter cattle by the millions? Or if that's not decisive enough, a Claymore to the back of the head? The issue is more about appearances and sensibilities. Apparently the powers that be want neither rapid methods in which the damage being done is shockingly visible, nor slow methods that leave a perfectly intact corpse but cause protracted suffering. Hanging, like (as we've learned) lethal injection, fails somewhat (and sometimes, when things go wrong, quite a lot) in both respects.

Industrial accidents appear to demonstrate that nitrogen asphyxiation causes immediate loss of consciousness and rapid death thereafter. Unlike drowning in water, there's no reflex to hold one's breath, which is one of the things that makes it so dangerous in accident situations. In practice, though, unlike in accidents the victim will almost certainly be aware when the next exhalation will end their life, and so will hold their breath for as long as possible, which I suspect will make the process less placid than its proponents are hoping.
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They want it to be a spectacle, in order to act as a deterrent more, but not to be a spectacle, so it isn't just so obviously satisfying the bloodlust masses.

In the past, hanging was the 'socially acceptable spectacle', because keeping the masses happy was a more publicly acknowledged motivating force than it is today. It was a community activity to come jeer at the damned. It was both a sign of protection, the powers that be are removing a threat from you environment, and a threat, they can also remove you and everyone will cheer.

Today the public is more mindful of secondary, higher, motivations. They want to appear more moral. So executions have to do the same thing as before, but with some excuse of deniability. It has to be merciful, and protection, and community building, and a threat.

Those dynamics, along with the history of use in lynchings, remove things like hanging, firing squad (still used actually), beheading, and burning at the stake. These are all 'bad guy' executions in that they are used by the villains of history.



As long as we are throwing in how we'd want to be done in by the state, I'd like something that acknowledges my danger more. Something like 'by the canon' or 'nuke him from orbit'. Maybe a living modern 'viking' funeral; strap me to a rocket and then shoot it down.
 
Dave Rogers said:
Having occasionally washed my hands in liquid nitrogen without ill effects, I can state from personal experience that this won't work.

Dave
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Liquid nitrogen is like quicksand. How it behaves in movies and tv shows and how it behaves in reality are completely different. The closest I can recall off the top of my head is an episode of "Bones" in which the lab technicians tested a theory by buying a turkey at the grocery store, freezing it in liquid nitrogen, and dropping it off a balcony in the lab. They expected it to shatter like glass, but it bounced like a bowling ball, causing significant damage to some equipment and getting them reprimanded by their boss
 
sphenisc said:
The lawyers want to stop the execution, arguing that if something goes wrong, he might ....asphyxiate.

So what happens if it goes right?
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Painless drift into sleep, followed by asphyxiation, probably. I'm sure you understand why some people think it's important to stop an execution if the method could leave the subject conscious while they die. I bet you even agree that would mean the execution went wrong.

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Really, all these methods have the same problem to solve: Ensure that the subject isn't conscious while dying.

Some methods attempt to solve the problem by ensuring instantaneous death. Mechanical separation of the head from the neck at high speed, for example. We're easily able to build machinery that completes the action far faster than the human brain can follow. So it seems like this would be a good one. But... nobody can agree on exactly when death occurs, and how instantaneous it really is. Does the brain continue to function for a moment or two after separation? Is that enough time for them to register that they're dying? Is that experience, or the fear of that experience enough to qualify the method as "cruel"?

So let's table mechanical separation at high speed, for now. That includes hanging, which is a primitive mechanism, relying on gravity and body weight to accomplish the snapping of the neck. That's not especially fast, and requires extra effort to get right. And even getting it right, there's the drop, and the question of brain function after separation.

Other methods attempt to solve the problem by rendering the subject unconscious before the dying process begins. The main issue here is that not everyone responds the same to anesthesia. Pre-made doses may fail to perform in some cases. Sometimes it's a series of chemicals. First the knock-out drug, then the poison. You have to make sure the knock-out drug worked. There's also cases where the subject has regained consciousness during the process.

So. If the requirement is an ironclad guarantee that the subject will not consciously experience their own dying, then no proposed method is fit for purpose.

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And that's another answer to Darat's question, "why not hanging?" Because it's a clumsy, primitive method of mechanical separation. It doesn't guarantee that the subject won't experience their dying moments.

If we really are committed to the idea that (a) the death penalty is necessary, and (b) mechanical separation of the head is the method will satisfy our main requirement to an acceptable degree of reliability...

... Then we wouldn't choose hanging. We'd choose something faster and with less room for error. A high-pressure-driven guillotine, probably.

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There's also sudden catastrophic damage to the brain. A bullet to the head, for example. But you'd want it to be a big bullet, to make sure it got enough of the brain to guarantee failure to experience death. Might as well go with a mechanical elephant's foot, at that point.

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There are other problems, too. These are gruesome acts. Is it humane to charge someone with carrying them out, or overseeing them? Do we want to make a welcome place in our society for the kind of person that enjoys doing such things?

Some large amounts of grue aside, rapid and catastrophic destruction of the body seems promising. An explosive collar around the neck, for example. But I'm pretty sure such dismemberment or destruction of the body is anathema to some religions. Apart from religion, if the subject has a horror of such things, is it unacceptably cruel to cause them to anticipate that?

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It's easy to say that people who have committed heinous crimes, without remorse or any care for humanity, do not deserve such humane considerations as a guaranteed "clean" death, or a death compatible with their religious beliefs. But once we concede that some people deserve death, but do not deserve additional torment or disrespect, we are burdened with creating a method of execution that meets that standard.

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One elephant I run into, whenever I enter this particular room, is a general refusal to accept a less-than-perfect solution. Even the best system will occasionally convict innocent people. It is my belief that if due process is followed, then it is not a miscarriage of justice to convict an innocent person. Or rather, it is not more of a miscarraige than not prosecuting the accused, for fear of getting it wrong.

So I think that less-than-perfect methods of execution should be on the table for consideration. If we're 99.9% certain that rapid separation of the head prevents death-experience, then we should do that. If chemical sleep unto death is shown to work reliably on 99.9% of subjects, then we should do that. The debate should be about how many nines we want, and how we're going to measure them, rather than a binary "guaranteed perfect or nothing" demand.

If you're going to demand guaranteed perfect or nothing, why even have prisons?
 
Darat said:
This thread was sparked by this article:

https://www.themarshallproject.org/2024/01/18/alabama-nitrogen-execution-death-penalty

The article is about an upcoming execution in which they are going to use nitrogen suffocation to kill the prisoner. It's a method never used before, and it does seem - like the article says - entirely experimental.

If you read the article, you'll see that there are a variety of methods proposed or being used yet I see nowhere is using hanging. It's been used for centuries, carried out properly it is instantaneous, we know how it works, there are even hangmen in some countries that could give hands-on advice.

So, my question is why all these weird and experimental execution methods when there is a perfectly good method they could adopt? What is the reluctance to use hanging?

(Thread isn't meant to be about the punishment of the death penalty itself, not interested in a debate about whether it is right or wrong in this thread.)
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Yeah measured drop seems pretty quick. But get it wrong, and you have someone slowly strangulating, or a decapitation. We need Albert Pierrepoint to wake from the grave and show us Americans how to do it right.

I'd take nitrogen suffocation myself if I was the condemned.
 
Myriad said:
What others said about hanging.

It's not difficult finding ways of execution where cessation of conscious thought is instantaneous. How about the kind of bolt gun used to routinely and reliably slaughter cattle by the millions? Or if that's not decisive enough, a Claymore to the back of the head? The issue is more about appearances and sensibilities. Apparently the powers that be want neither rapid methods in which the damage being done is shockingly visible, nor slow methods that leave a perfectly intact corpse but cause protracted suffering. Hanging, like (as we've learned) lethal injection, fails somewhat (and sometimes, when things go wrong, quite a lot) in both respects.

Industrial accidents appear to demonstrate that nitrogen asphyxiation causes immediate loss of consciousness and rapid death thereafter. Unlike drowning in water, there's no reflex to hold one's breath, which is one of the things that makes it so dangerous in accident situations. In practice, though, unlike in accidents the victim will almost certainly be aware when the next exhalation will end their life, and so will hold their breath for as long as possible, which I suspect will make the process less placid than its proponents are hoping.
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Why not the traditional Scottish guillotine?
 
They say drowning is a peaceful way to go. I mean, with all the drugs and chemicals that will knock your ass out in an instant, I don't get why execution always resorts to overcomplicated means that don't seem to reliably work anyway. Clorophorm the brother, then, you know, whatever. Sledgehammer to the noggin.

And another vote that the state hanging black men is not going to be stellar PC optics.
 
Thermal said:
They say drowning is a peaceful way to go. I mean, with all the drugs and chemicals that will knock your ass out in an instant, I don't get why execution always resorts to overcomplicated means that don't seem to reliably work anyway. Clorophorm the brother, then, you know, whatever. Sledgehammer to the noggin.

And another vote that the state hanging black men is not going to be stellar PC optics.
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Who in the hell says that :confused: They're wrong.
 
For sure drowning sucks if you're trying to fight it. But once you give up and let it happen, how bad is it really?

Maybe if we give you two Xanax and a glass of wine, first?
 
Darat said:
It can't be the rare failure - as you say that happens with the current methods as well.

It just seemed very strange to me that hanging doesn't even seem to be considered yet they try and invent all new methods of execution.
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New for the sake of being new does appear to have driven choices of U.S. execution methods for the past 135 years. Electric chairs, gas chambers, and lethal injection were all in their turn touted as more modern (or even, unfortunately, "scientific"), and therefore (by implication) cleaner, faster, better. It's reasonable to surmise that being different from methods used in the past, and thereby avoiding association with past societies or injustices that used those same methods, has been the real reason.

That said, assuming reliable functioning in all cases, nitrogen asphyxiation does seem a better choice in principle. In practice, it might get screwed up. For instance, it appears that concerns over officiants or spectators being harmed by "leaking nitrogen" (!) will necessitate the use of a tight-fitting mask instead of e.g. a high-flow hood. That makes it possible the victim will end up slowly strangling from insufficient flow rather than passing out from rapid hypoxia.
 
lobosrul5 said:
Who in the hell says that :confused: They're wrong.
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I've read about it from multiple survivors who were recessitated. If you are deep in the land of nod first, courtesy of a convenient chemical, theres no fight for survival that would be the unpleasant bit.
 
Thermal said:
I've read about it from multiple survivors who were recessitated. If you are deep in the land of nod first, courtesy of a convenient chemical, theres no fight for survival that would be the unpleasant bit.
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Well yes, if you are rendered unconscious first it'd be OK I guess. But why not just go with the nitrogen asphyxiation route?
 
Myriad said:
New for the sake of being new does appear to have driven choices of U.S. execution methods for the past 135 years.
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I think it's more a matter of "new for the sake of the perfect being the enemy of the good".

The state keeps having to come up with new methods because there's always someone who thinks the current methods are unconscionable. There's no process by which the state can say, "this is as good as it gets, for any method, stop complaining, we're not going to change it just because you keep imagining there must be a better way."

ETA: And I'm pretty sure that in some cases, the objections are being raised by people who want to abolish the death penalty, but can't convince voters to do so. Thus they resort to blocking the executions themselves on procedural or regulatory grounds. This puts the state in the awkward position of having to keep executing convicts according to the will of the voters, but also keep trying new methods in an attempt to appease the objectors.

It's not a simple case of Americans just wanting to try new things for no reason. It's a complex case of Americans trying to do the right thing, both in terms of justice served and in terms of humane treatment of convicts.
 
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lobosrul5 said:
Well yes, if you are rendered unconscious first it'd be OK I guess. But why not just go with the nitrogen asphyxiation route?
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Water is cheap, and they probably already have a tub in the prison somewhere. Why fool around with nitrogen?

ETA: never go high tech when low tech works better.
 
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