The Community of Sant’Egidio, a group founded in Rome and known for mediating conflicts worldwide, shared a petition Jan. 23, 2024, urging Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey to halt the execution of convicted murderer Kenneth “Kenny” Eugene Smith. / Credit: Alabama Department of Corrections
CNA Staff, Jan 23, 2024 / 17:50 pm (CNA).
A lay Catholic community dedicated to peace efforts has expressed concern about an execution scheduled in Alabama for Jan. 25, set to be carried out using a relatively untested method called nitrogen hypoxia.
The Community of Sant’Egidio, a group founded in Rome and known for mediating conflicts worldwide, shared a petition Jan. 23 urging Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey to halt the execution of convicted murderer Kenneth “Kenny” Eugene Smith.
Smith is scheduled to die Thursday after being convicted for the 1988 murder of Elizabeth Dorlene Sennett, whom Sennett’s husband, a Protestant pastor, had paid Smith to kill. The state of Alabama attempted in November 2022 to execute Smith by way of lethal injection but postponed his execution after an attempt to administer the injection was unsuccessful.
Sant’Egidio, which has advocated for many years for an end to the death penalty, says that Smith will be the first person in the world to be executed using nitrogen hypoxia, which involves the fitting of a mask over the condemned person’s face and pure nitrogen — a normally harmless gas — being pumped through it, leading to suffocation.
“We are asking that this execution be stopped because the world cannot afford to regress to the stage of killing in a more barbaric way,” said Mario Marazziti, who heads Sant’Egidio’s death penalty abolition group, as reported Tuesday by ABC News.
The United Nations Human Rights Office warned this month that the novel execution method — which is controversial due to a lack of data on what the inmate could experience during the execution — could amount to torture under international human rights law. In a Jan.16 press release, Ravina Shamdasani, U.N. high commissioner for human rights, noted that nitrogen gas has never been used in the United States to execute human beings.
“The American Veterinary Medical Association recommends giving even large animals a sedative when being euthanized in this manner, while Alabama’s protocol for execution by nitrogen asphyxiation makes no provision for sedation of human beings prior to execution,” the U.N. high commissioner noted.
Catholic Mobilizing Network, a Catholic advocacy group that demonstrates against the death penalty, urged Catholics to speak out against Smith’s scheduled execution and the method being used.
“Kenny should not be subjected to a second execution, especially with the uncertainty that surrounds this new, untested method,” the group said.
According to the Death Penalty Information Center, Alabama introduced nitrogen hypoxia as a method of execution in August 2023 and is the first state to create and release a protocol for using the method. “Lethal gas” is authorized as an execution method in seven states, though only three have specifically authorized the use of nitrogen, the center states.
Alabama’s death penalty has been under scrutiny for the past several years because of a number of failed executions. A notable botched execution took place in 2018 when Doyle Lee Hamm was strapped to a gurney for two and a half hours as prison medical officials were unable to find a suitable vein for the lethal injection.
The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday denied Smith’s request to review the constitutionality of his death sentence, the AP reported.
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No offense, but who installed this “security system” for this church? The three stooges? These people had time to do NOISY wreckage in both the church and the Sacristy, cutting through metal to get the tabernacle, decapitating statues in the church, somehow opening a safe in the sacristy, yet NOBODY heard them? How, in fact, did they manage to even enter the church?? How is the security system monitored and WHERE was it located such that the thieves were able to make off with vital components which could have been used to identify them? . The monitor and its films should have been elsewhere in the church facility, in the rectory or church offices separate from the church itself. There should have been an electric eye in front of the tabernacle and possibly at all entrances of the church so that an AUTOMATIC alarm would be sent to a central monitoring station allowing police to be summoned immediately. Even my modest home has such a system. The tabernacle was worth $2 million but adequate protection was not deemed necessary? Not to mention the value of the tabernacle as a HOLY object to believers, which is to say it’s priceless. . I hope the tabernacle is recovered but I also hope that whoever is in charge of this parish has the smarts to get a more adept security company to do a PROPER job of protecting this church. Clergy need to wake up to the fact that life is not as it was, when even thieves had a certain element of respect. We no longer have that attitude in play and must act accordingly to protect objects of sacred value.
Absolutely right, LJ.
Our bishops, our pastors and our parishioners all need to realize that we Catholics are being persecuted.
These security measures are not rocket science. As you point out, many prudential home owners are undertaking them themselves.
Perhaps a first step might be to stop voting for candidates of the political party that is persecuting us?
Huh, Catholics? What do you say?
Don’t hold your breath waiting for the MSM to notice, much less, condemn these anti-Catholic incidents.