Alabama plans to execute 54-year-old Anthony Boyd on Thursday evening at the William C. Holman Correctional Facility, marking the state’s latest use of nitrogen gas — a method now preferred over lethal injection. Boyd was convicted of capital murder in the 1993 killing of 26-year-old Willie Johnson, who was abducted and found burned in Anniston, Alabama, following a dispute over a $200 cocaine debt.
A jury recommended the death penalty in a 10-2 vote, and state officials say the case has been litigated for three decades. Boyd maintains his innocence, telling reporters earlier this month, “I didn’t participate in any killing.” His attorneys sought to block the execution, arguing nitrogen hypoxia causes “conscious suffocation,” citing witnesses who described shaking and gasping during previous executions.
Spiritual adviser Rev. Jeff Hood called the method “the most viscerally horrible by far.” Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall’s office said the state followed all legal protocols.
Boyd’s execution will be Alabama’s sixth using nitrogen gas since the state adopted the procedure last year, making it the first in the nation to regularly use the method.
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