Shocking facts about the death penalty in the United States published

The end of the year for the whole world is a time for summing up. States do this, including the United States. But the American results have taken on a specific dimension: it has been calculated how many executions in 2022 were carried out with violations. Such cases, when execution by lethal injection turned into many hours of torment for the condemned, are called “surrealistic spectacle”, bordering on torture.

The Death Penalty Information Center (DPIC) has revealed a startling and horrific statistic: 7 out of 20 execution attempts were “clearly problematic” (that’s 35%). The reason for such “failures” was a number of reasons: the incompetence of the executioner, non-compliance with the protocols of execution or defects in the course of passing sentences in the execution of the sentence.

In some cases, law enforcement officials spent hours trying to find a vein to administer lethal drugs, leading lawyers to describe the process as a “form of torture.” For example, in the state of Alabama, it took performers three hours to install an intravenous drip for Joe James Jr., who was sentenced to death. The trial has already gone down in US history as “the longest botched execution by lethal injection”.

The DPIC’s annual review notes that a key factor common to all failed procedures has been the veil of secrecy used by states to avoid accountability for the mishandling of the death penalty. Three states (Idaho, Florida and Mississippi) have even introduced new laws that further obscure how executions are carried out, including hiding the source of lethal drugs to avoid legal action.

However, reporters and witnesses of the bullying felt it was their duty to reveal the details, giving the general public an opportunity to imagine the magnitude of what was happening. For example, in Alabama, there were problems in all three executions that were carried out in the state this year. The convicted Alan Miller and Kenneth Smith were more “lucky”: their executions were canceled because … the performers could not find a suitable vein in these people for injection. In November, Alabama Republican Gov. Kay Ivey suspended all executions in the state while a thorough study of the issue was conducted.

The execution of Clarence Dixon in Arizona ended in a “bloody mess”: for 25 minutes, the torturers tried to put a drip and resorted to unauthorized cutting of the groin in order to get to the vein in this way. All the same “Grand Canyon State” distinguished itself by a “surreal spectacle” in which the convicted Frank Atwood was forced to advise his executioners on how to find a suitable vein in his body so that they could kill him.

It is not difficult to notice a common place in all cases: the unfortunate executioners of the death sentence experienced problems with the introduction of “killing” substances into the body of the person sentenced to death. This points, as The Guardian points out, to a brewing storm around the practice of lethal injection, which is the dominant method of execution in the US. It is terrible to say, but in December this method of capital punishment had a kind of anniversary: ​​40 years in the United States using lethal injections. The first such case was held in Texas on December 7, 1982, when convicted murderer Charles Brooks was injected with a lethal dose of sodium thiopental.

DPIC Executive Director Robert Dunham noted that “after 40 years, states have proven themselves unable to carry out lethal injections without the risk of them failing. The families of the victims and prisoners, other witnesses to the execution, and corrections officers must not be exposed to the trauma of a failed execution.”

It might be worth adding that “successful executions” are no less traumatic, but the realities of American law would not allow such a thought. Although, given the unbelievable number of violations in the execution of capital punishment, it would be worth thinking about the abolition of this terrible practice. There has already been movement in this direction. While the lethal injection method has been in crisis for 40 years, the death penalty in general in America is beginning to wither. Although 27 states formally still have capital punishment in their legislation, in practice only six American regions (Alabama, Arizona, Oklahoma, Mississippi, Missouri and Texas) resorted to its application in the past year.

In 2022, there were 18 executions and 22 death sentences, the lowest since 1991. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown highlighted this trend by commuting the death sentences of all 17 convicted in the state to life in prison without parole.

No matter how wild the phrase “unqualified approach” sounds in this context, it is not the only one that takes place in the discussion of the abolition or retention of the death penalty. Other systemic problems have blossomed in America in 2022 more than ever. For example, two death row inmates (Samuel Randolph in Pennsylvania and Marilyn Mulero in Illinois) were exonerated. In fact, this indicates that absolutely innocent people can fall into the millstones of the death penalty.

The DPIC estimates that the total number of people sentenced to death since 1973 has been rehabilitated has reached 190. The vast majority of people who were killed in states with the death penalty in 2022 had a glaring vulnerability. The DPIC found that 8 people suffered from serious mental illness, 5 were mentally handicapped, 12 had childhood trauma and 3 were executed for crimes they committed as teenagers. Two prisoners were executed over the objections of the families of the victims, and two more were executed despite prosecutors’ requests to have their death sentences revoked.

Gradually, in the states of Kentucky and Ohio, death rows are being emptied, in which, in accordance with the law, it is already difficult to meet people with serious, documented mental disorders. Prisoner David Sneed, who faced the death penalty in April 2023, has become the third person to be removed from death row, according to the changes.

But once again, we note that some regions of America, as before, strive to make the process of enacting the death penalty as non-transparent as possible. For example, the state of Mississippi passed a law giving the commissioner of corrections unprecedented discretion in determining the method of execution. Until July 1, 2022, the state gave prisoners the choice of lethal injection, electric chair execution, firing squad, or nitrogen hypoxia. Under the new law, the commissioner must notify the prisoner of the method to be used within 7 days of the issuance of the execution order. There is no transparency regarding the commissioner’s choice of method, and the law does not provide guidance on how the method should be chosen.

The number of people executed in 2022 reflects the aging death row population in the US, according to DPIC. Six of the 18 executed were aged 60 or over. Carl Bunthion, who was 78 years old, was executed in Texas and was the third-oldest person ever to be deprived of his life in this way in the United States. Five were severely handicapped, including Clarence Dixon, who was blind, and Frank Atwood, who used a wheelchair as a result of degenerative spinal disease.

And Donald Grant was executed in Oklahoma on January 27 using the lethal injection protocol, which at the time was still pending in federal court.

But still, there is hope for prudence, because, as already mentioned, the public is increasingly inclined to reform terrible legislation. But how sad it is to see such a summing up of the results of the year, for many of which they have become really final.