Three liberal Supreme Court justices have just thrown a wrench into the debate over capital punishment with a fiery dissent against a controversial execution method.
The Hill reported that Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Ketanji Brown Jackson, and Elena Kagan have sharply criticized the use of nitrogen hypoxia in the execution of an Alabama man, calling it a violation of constitutional protections against cruel punishment.
Let’s rewind to the early 1990s, when Anthony Boyd, alongside three others, was convicted of a horrific crime—helping to burn a man alive in 1993.
Boyd, sentenced to death, has long insisted he wasn’t even at the scene, claiming he was at a party when the murder occurred.
Fast forward to last Thursday, when the Supreme Court’s conservative majority declined to halt Boyd’s execution, despite his plea to face a firing squad instead of nitrogen gas.
Alabama proceeded with the execution that very night, strapping Boyd to a gurney and pumping nitrogen gas through a mask—a method only used in two states, Alabama and Louisiana.
According to witnesses cited by The New York Times, Boyd didn’t go quietly; he convulsed and heaved for a grueling 15 minutes before being pronounced dead.
Before the gas flowed, Boyd made one last stand, declaring, “I just wanna say again, I didn’t kill anybody, I didn’t participate in killing anybody,” as reported in court records.
Now, let’s talk about that dissent—Justice Sotomayor didn’t hold back, painting a chilling picture with her words: “Now imagine for that entire time, you are suffocating. You want to breathe; you have to breathe. But you are strapped to a gurney with a mask on your face, pumping your lungs with nitrogen gas.”
She wasn’t done, either. “Your mind knows that the gas will kill you. But your body keeps telling you to breathe,” Sotomayor continued, hammering home the terror of the method.
From a conservative angle, it’s hard to ignore the raw humanity in her words, but let’s be real—courts aren’t therapy sessions, and the Constitution isn’t a feelings charter; it’s about law, and Boyd’s crime was monstrous, even if prosecutors admit he didn’t light the fatal fire.
Still, Sotomayor’s plea for “the barest form of mercy” in granting Boyd’s request for a firing squad stings as a missed chance for pragmatism over progressive hand-wringing—why not let the man choose a quicker end if the option exists?
Here’s the rub: only Alabama and Louisiana have pulled the trigger—so to speak—on nitrogen hypoxia, while Mississippi has it as a backup if lethal injection isn’t available.
Other states are mulling over adding this method to their books, which begs the question—are we innovating justice or just finding new ways to dodge the deeper debate on capital punishment itself?
From a right-leaning view, the liberal justices’ outcry feels like another chapter in the endless push to soften consequences, yet even the staunchest law-and-order advocate might pause at 15 minutes of agony—surely, if we’re serious about justice, efficiency and humanity can coexist without caving to a no-punishment agenda.