Beheadings, firing squads and gas chambers: It's not ISIS it's Oklahoma [View all]

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Beheadings-firing-squads-by-B-Blake-America_Beheadings_Death_Drugs-150215-482.html



Beheadings, firing squads and gas chambers: It's not ISIS it's Oklahoma
By B Blake
OpEdNews Op Eds 2/15/2015 at 09:11:39

An Oklahoma lawmaker who recently advocated the beheading of American death row inmates, has backed a bill he says provides an "innovative" new way of executing prisoners - gas chambers.

Mike Christian, an Oklahoma City Republican and former Highway patrol-man who conducted a study last summer into hypoxia, or the depletion of oxygen in the bloodstream,says smothering prisoners to death with nitrogen gas will be "fast and painless" and is "cheaper than the bullets you need for a firing squad."

And, with no questions or debate, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted 9-0 Tuesday to authorize "nitrogen hypoxia" as Oklahoma's backup method of state killing, if lethal injection is ruled unconstitutional or if the deadly drugs become unavailable.

For executions with the gas, inmates would either be suffocated in airtight chambers or have a plastic sack placed over their heads.