Tennessee Brings Back Electric Chair
While lethal injections are being debated, an even less-humane procedure is coming back to Tennessee.
Republican Gov. Bill Haslam signed a bill into law Thursday allowing the state to electrocute death row inmates in the event prisons are unable to obtain the drugs, which have become more and more scarce following a European-led boycott of drug sales for executions.
Tennessee lawmakers overwhelmingly passed the electric chair legislation in April, with the Senate voting 23-3 and the House 68-13 in favor of the bill.
Tennessee is the first state to enact a law to reintroduce the electric chair without giving prisoners an option, said Richard Dieter, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, a Washington-based nonprofit organization that opposes executions and tracks the issue.
Maxx44 May 23rd, 2014 at 9:20 am
Odd how the so-called “right to life” crowd can’t wait to kill people in the most inhumane ways they can think of.
Tom Ward May 23rd, 2014 at 12:14 pm
I think they blame Europe for withholding humane lethal injection drugs, which is weird because you can find the same exact drug in just about every veterinarian clinic in the country. Death penalty just isn’t worth all the hoops that must be jumped through.
fahvel May 23rd, 2014 at 9:48 am
what options are offered????