South Carolina prison officials told death row inmate Richard Moore on Tuesday that he can choose between a firing squad, the electric chair and lethal injection for his Nov. 1 execution.
State law gives Moore until Oct. 18 to decide or by default he will be electrocuted. His execution would mark the second in South Carolina after a 13-year pause due to the state not being able to obtain a drug needed for lethal injection.
Moore, 59, is facing the death penalty for the September 1999 shooting of store clerk James Mahoney. Moore went into the Spartanburg County store unarmed to rob it and the two ended up in a shootout after Moore was able to take one of Mahoney’s guns. Moore was wounded, while Mahoney died from a bullet to the chest.
A meant a leak in the chamber would possibly put the facility at risk, not just having the chamber. And we know the kind of maintenance a chamber used maybe a handful of times a year is going to get to keep it air tight. Plus it’s added cost to the already absurd cost of killing someone, instead of actually trying to rehabilitate them (will always be some that cannot be of course). And putting it outside then makes the air tight chamber subjected to the weather/elements, adding more cost in maintenance.
And I know you mentioned the mask vs chamber thing, but I don’t see it going differently just because they are going to vacuum oxygen out and nitrogen in. And would also add the cost of further staff training on opening a chamber full of nitrogen (potentially) rather than a room with possibly some nitrogen from a leaking mask. Just don’t see the cost analysis of this being in the ballpark of cost effective when we could put that money to better use.
A leak in the chamber wouldn’t put the whole facility at risk. This isn’t Zyklon B; it takes a lot of nitrogen to cause hypoxia.
And using a mask increases blood CO2 levels which is what caused the issues in Alabama.