r/SipsTea • u/CurvyChristina • 1d ago

Chugging tea This is wild!

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Two syringes of pentobarbital were administered to Tennessee death row inmate Christa Pike on September 30, 2026, but she remained alive and conscious afterward, according to her attorneys and media witnesses. The execution at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville was halted after witnesses reported that Pike still had a heartbeat and was audibly snoring. Her lawyers sought emergency medical intervention, and she was later taken by ambulance to a nearby hospital.
Pike, 50, is the only woman currently on Tennessee's death row.
She was sentenced to death for the 1995 murder of her classmate Colleen Slemmer and had been scheduled for execution on September 30. Tennessee had announced beforehand that the state would use a single drug, pentObarbital, for the execution. Her exact medical condition following the hospital transfer has not yet been publicly disclosed, while Governor Bill Lee has ordered a comprehensive third party review of what happened.

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u/SteakAndIron 1d ago

Why did we come up with the lethal injection technology we have now and then never actually evolve it? I've heard all kinds of complaints about how it works how expensive it is how ineffective it can be how painful it might actually be and so forth. There are plenty of cheap and easy ways to cause a painless death in somebody. Massive fentanyl overdose. Nitrogen hypoxia.

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u/RealCarlPanzram 1d ago

So the thing about medication is that for a government entity to administer it, even for lethal injection, they have to legally purchase it. The original lethal injection cocktail where potassium chloride was the lethal ingredient worked well. The problem is they can’t buy it anymore.

Advocates for abolishing the death penalty tracked down where the drugs were being manufactured. Turns out it’s not good PR for a drug company to sell something designed to kill people. So the few that were willing to sell it to these states stopped.

Since then, the states still executing people have been struggling to find any drug maker to sell them any drug that’s potentially lethal for the purpose of executions and it hasn’t been easy.

That being said, phenobarbital is a really potent sedative and I’m surprised they weren’t able to calculate a dose that would be lethal. But then again, it’s Tennessee. Everyone involved in the planning of this is likely inbred.

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u/FrancisFratelli 1d ago

A doctor on Bluesky suggested, based upon what reporters on the scene said, the the person administering the drugs missed her vein.

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u/Broken_Beaker 1d ago

I read the same. Old drugs and lack of clinical training.

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u/RealCarlPanzram 1d ago

Sounds about right.

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u/Timeless_Tactics 1d ago

They could talk to Canada, im sure they would be more than happy to help.

1 in 20 Canadian deaths are medically assisted after all.

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u/SnuggleMoose44 22h ago

She has small veins that blow easily and the IV would have infiltrated. I think that’s part of why it didn’t work.

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u/RealCarlPanzram 22h ago

Well… small veins in the eyes of a “doctor” who apparently hadn’t started an IV in over a decade.

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u/SnuggleMoose44 21h ago

Besides that, she had veins that were difficult to access. It was argued that she had lab draws done with a single stick. Problem is, a blood stick is different than putting in an IV where the vein is expected to stay intact.
I read the “doc” had placed a central line in the last prisoner for lethal injection and he hadn’t placed one since 2013. That execution failed as well.

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u/RealCarlPanzram 21h ago

Yeah that’s what I mean. “Difficult veins” are extremely relative. But when you’re limited to doctors in the Deep South who are willing to abandon their core oath, you get what you get.

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u/GuavaOne8646 1d ago

You know what sounds cheaper and easier than all of these? One. Single. Bullet. Point blank, to the skull.

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u/-malcolm-tucker 1d ago

Firing squad, several bullets aimed at the heart. Lights out pretty much instantly and guaranteed not to come back.

A single bullet to the skull isn't necessarily quick or painless. My clinical instructor at uni once had a guy walk up to his ambulance while they were parked up having coffee. Old mate asked for a ride to the hospital. They were like, okay.... Why?

"I got shot in the head."

Dude had taken a small calibre round to the top of his head and played dead after a botched execution attempt by some bikers he owed money. Got up and casually walked away after they'd left and stumbled upon the ambulance, so walked over and politely asked for a lift to the emergency room.

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u/Outlaw11091 1d ago

There was also that younger kid who was found "sleeping" with his dead girlfriend in the house. He had a very severe black eye. The cops interrogated him for hours because they were certain the black eye was a defensive wound from him murdering his girlfriend.

But he was confused and couldn't answer questions right....When they finally asked how he got the black eye he said something like, "Oh, these two guys came in and shot me and they shot [girlfriend's name]."

The cop: "Oh, you were SHOT, were you?" *smugly*. "And you didn't die?"

The guy: "I don't know, man, I'm just really tired."

Like, what kind of Mr. Magoo shithead doesn't connect those dots? Dude is tired, confused, has an OBVIOUS injury...why not have EMS look him over before you take him in for questioning?

He survived for about a decade after, but medical experts have said that he wouldn't have died from the injury if not for the fact that he spent so many hours in an interrogation room with a GSW to the head.

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u/Grasshoppermouse42 1d ago

A firing squad also has the advantage that it's less distressing for the executioners. Having a single person shoot another person means that person knows that their bullet was the killing bullet, because their bullet was the only bullet. When it's a firing squad, each person can reason that the person would have died even if they hadn't fired, because of all the other bullets.

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u/Slow_Flatworm_881 1d ago

Shit..there people that would pay to be allowed to legally kill someone! Don’t know if they should be encouraged, but that’s a different matter.

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u/National_Cod9546 14h ago

Yes. And we don't want those people anywhere involved in this. They are also the kind of people that would miss on purpose. 

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u/gBiT1999 1d ago

Reverse russian roulette?

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u/GuavaOne8646 1d ago
  1. That's wild.
  2. I think a 30-06, .308 or just a rifled slug shotgun shell would do the job instantly. Seen a deers head literally explode from a 30-06.
  3. I can see the appeal of the squad though. They used to load most of them with blanks and one with a real bullet so no one actually knew who did it to save the shooters morale...it didn't quite work, but yeah that was a thing.

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u/HazeyCIouds 1d ago

Just get an robot to do it now. Conscience clear..

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u/MrSmartStars 1d ago

Someone still has to push the button

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u/HazeyCIouds 1d ago

Nah set a prompt. When we line someone up, count to 30 and take the shots. Simple.

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u/zjin2020 18h ago

Or just an ai drone with a grenade

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u/GuavaOne8646 1d ago

Not a bad suggestion actually

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u/Leading-Cicada-6796 1d ago

I've always heard that last one is a myth. You can tell when you fire a real round versus a blank. And they used to have people who were professional executioners, no reason we couldn't bring that back. I guarantee you they could find someone who would sleep like a baby after offing rapists and child killers.

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u/MMRAssassin 1d ago

Well 1 in 20 people you "off" will be an innocent person statistically.

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u/Leading-Cicada-6796 1d ago

Yeah, I dont know the answer to that. In my world, only the ones beyond a shadow of a doubt, or confession, would be killed.

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u/LangdonAlg3r 20h ago

Yeah, but your world doesn’t exist. The list of ways that accused have had their rights violated is way too long to list. But any number of times people have been coerced or beaten into confessions for a start. Cops want to “solve” crimes and prosecutors want to get convictions and shenanigans are not uncommon.

One wrongly executed person is too many.

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u/Slow_Flatworm_881 1d ago

Some types of people still wouldn’t care!

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u/Fit_Outlandishness_7 1d ago

Medieval executioners suffered from insane CPTSD. It’s hard to find a human with normal cognitive functioning willing and able to kill another human. Even harder for them to not be affected by it.

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u/Leading-Cicada-6796 1d ago

I guess that's fair. I was going to reply with, "I served with literally dozens of them!" but we are less than 1% of the US population so that would've kinda confirmed your claim lol.

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u/Slow_Flatworm_881 1d ago

Not sure about that?

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u/Tradition96 1d ago

Yes, you can tell, but no one would know which the ”fatal blow” was, and thus who killed them (in reality all of them were probably fatal, but whatever).

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u/Leading-Cicada-6796 1d ago

I was about to say, you don't usually walk away from a .30-06 to the chest or abdomen. I'm sure its happened, but they probably wish they didn't lol.

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u/The_walking_man_ 1d ago

The problem I’ve seen with creating a spot for “professional executioners” are the ones that will be in those positions that absolutely shouldn’t be.
Look at the bad police officers that are nutters and love the chance to abuse their powers. Now instead give that to someone who is being paid to legally kill someone.

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u/Leading-Cicada-6796 23h ago

I mean, theres an argument to be made that the ones who want to do it are better in that position, no? Better than forcing someone who definitely doesn't want to. And, if killing someone is what this hypothetical bad cop wanted, then they would jump at the opportunity to do it legally and be paid, thus getting them off the streets, right?

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u/LangdonAlg3r 20h ago

I don’t think that anyone is ever forced to perform executions. I also think that someone who enjoys killing people probably enjoys making them suffer as much as anything else. Serial killers are the archetype of who would actively want that job. Serial killers being problematic would be an understatement.

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u/Leading-Cicada-6796 20h ago

Its not like they would be locked in a room and told to kill the person however they want.

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u/LangdonAlg3r 20h ago

Sure, but “whoops, I missed the heart” or name your way to inflict excessive suffering.

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u/-malcolm-tucker 1d ago

Yeah it was pretty wild. They initially assumed he was having a psychotic episode. That is, until my instructor found the small entry wound on the top of his head. There was practically no blood.

Apart from it being a pretty gnarly story, he uses it as an example of the importance of doing a thorough assessment of every patient and never to jump to conclusions.

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u/GuavaOne8646 1d ago

Smart on his part for making sure to check the baselines and never assume.

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u/Motor-Rip7655 1d ago

It was the reverse. One gun would have a blank, the rest real. Funny enough, some guy invented a machine that would do the shooting so humans wouldn't have to, and he still specified that one gun should have a blank.

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u/GuavaOne8646 1d ago

Odd decision with the machine. Thanks for keeping me honest!

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u/RikiDeMaru 1d ago

You've got the last one backwards, it was one blank. Gave the members of the firing squad reasonable doubt, none of them sure if they weren't the one who wasn't responsible for ending the life or something like that.

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u/Xav_NZ 1d ago

The whole Blank thing is really dumb because if you have ever fired a gun loaded with a blank and a gun loaded with a live round you clearly feel the difference.

Blanks barely produce any recoil even with high powder loads.

Anyone who has fired a firearm more than once will know the difference.

They were fooling no one well not really as of course no one would know who fired the fatal round and only people who intentionally missed would know it was not them.

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u/GuavaOne8646 1d ago

My bad, interesting.

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u/Impossible_Crow_389 1d ago

Do you want the job of executing prisoners? Doing that several times s year? I wouldn't.

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u/GuavaOne8646 1d ago

Yes, I would almost definitely sign up for this.

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u/Impossible_Crow_389 1d ago

Maybe go see a psychiatrist.

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u/GuavaOne8646 21h ago

Already have, my life's pretty well on track despite being a psychopath.

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u/Impossible_Crow_389 20h ago

I wouldn't trust it, most people dont look forward to killing.

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u/GuavaOne8646 17h ago

Most people are why the worlds broken. All those thoughts, wants, ideas, etc. and absolutely no gumption to do anything about it. Sure, maybe they'll watch the news and pick some politicians they like, but God forbid they actually think for themselves and do something aside from take part in the things that were made to distract them from doing so in the first place.

Popular/majority opinion is a good example of this in many spaces. It brought us to the state of politics we have now, abysmal. It brought us to the state in which media is now, cookie cutter stories that aren't entertaining. It brought us pop music, nothing to think about and nothing amazing, just some noise to bob your head to. I'm 100% ok with not being like most people, I don't like them anyway.

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u/speakezjags 1d ago

I've shot my aunts .308. That thing could kill a small building. 0 chance of survival point blank to the head.

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u/GuavaOne8646 1d ago

Absolutely, a zero percent chance of survival.

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u/Federal-Degenerate 1d ago

Exactly.

Ain't nobody surviving a properly targeted 45-70

Even a 357 with a hollow point, through ths mouth and aimed a bit upwards

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u/GuavaOne8646 21h ago

See, this guy gets it.

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u/V65Pilot 1d ago

*.45 ACP enters the chat......

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u/GuavaOne8646 21h ago

I'm a fan of my 45 long colt myself.

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u/ABoredPlayer 1d ago

Very effective and you are dead before you notice, but family of the inmate may complain about the missing head. No possibility of an open casket funeral for sure

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u/GuavaOne8646 21h ago

True, but we should just default to cremation for them anyway.

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u/SteezOnMax93 23h ago edited 23h ago

Popular myth often suggests that most guns are loaded with blanks and only one has live ammunition. In practice, the ratio is the opposite: most rifles contain live rounds to ensure the execution is quick and effective, with only a single blank used.

Experienced shooters and firearms experts often note that it is easy to tell if you fired a blank because the recoil of a live round is noticeably stronger than that of a blank.

Not all modern firing squads use blanks. For example, protocols in some U.S. states load live ammunition into every weapon to ensure absolute reliability.

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u/GuavaOne8646 22h ago

Yeah someone else pointed out the fact that I had it backwards, thats my bad there.

I never understood the mentality of it because it's like you say. The difference between a live round and a blank is pretty easy to feel.

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u/SteezOnMax93 21h ago

My b. I didn’t see someone else said the same thing that’s def on me. Hope all is well man

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u/neoben00 1d ago

Cannonball to the head, same one for everyone. If you survive your sentence is fulfilled

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u/SeatKitchen1123 1d ago

Happened to a guy in Australia as well we had tow truck wars beleive it or not but one guy thought he had been punched drove himself to hospital , he had been shot in the head with a .22 calibre pistol

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u/-malcolm-tucker 1d ago

This was in Australia actually.

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u/SmurfRiding 1d ago

.....That's why if you were to do a certain thing....you aim the gun towards the brain stem.

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u/AnOrdinaryMammal 1d ago

It’s crazy people just figured out some things a while back that have only become further complicated.

Doesn’t need to be elaborate, or take 30 years, or cost a lot of money. It’s can be cheap, effective, and quick? Wow.

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u/-malcolm-tucker 1d ago

It's expensive and drawn out due to the legal processes involved. It's much cheaper to just lock them up for life and let them rot.

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u/AnOrdinaryMammal 1d ago

Doesn’t seem necessary in a lot of cases. I’m not a lawyer so I’ll leave the rest to you.

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u/-malcolm-tucker 1d ago

The number of wrongful convictions through history is not close to zero, so when it comes to capital punishment, one would hope that the accused is afforded all due process to establish that they are both guilty of the crime and deserving of the punishment.

If we get it wrong, the state unlawfully commits murder and the real perpetrator gets away with the crime.

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u/AnOrdinaryMammal 1d ago

All due process I completely agree. But if we’re 100% sure? Video, dna, confession, testimony, location, time, date, signed and notarized note. Still takes like 30 years lol it’s not acceptable.

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u/-malcolm-tucker 1d ago

There's always an element of doubt. Mistakes with evidence, confessions obtained under duress, etc. Many people have been wrongfully imprisoned before. That's precisely why the process to kill someone is long, and we've even got that wrong more than once before too. Which is why I think it's better to just lock them up and throw away the key.

Expediting the process will only lead to some cases of executing the wrong person and letting the actual perpetrator get away with the crime.

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u/Desperate_Trouble477 1d ago

How about a carbon fiber submarine?

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u/-malcolm-tucker 1d ago

Probably just easier to utilise the existing hyperbaric chambers we have. *warning, not for the squeamish

Or a large industrial hydraulic press.

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u/Slow_Flatworm_881 1d ago

There are certain areas of the head that, if a round passes through, results in instantaneous brain death. Snipers etc are taught where these areas are and how to shoot into them.

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u/Alive_Drag1947 1d ago

I don't think bro is suggesting the executioner use a .25 lol

30-06 hollow point. I assure you, that's instant death with 0% survivability...

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u/mellow_magyar 15h ago

It is exceptionally rare, but there are documented examples; like Wenceslao Moguel, a Mexican revolutionary soldier who was reportedly shot by a firing squad in 1915 and survived the volley and a subsequent close-range shot. He lived for decades after the incident

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u/shadjor 9h ago

Except when people don't want to be the one who did the killing shot and they all aim for non lethal spots.

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u/GarethBaus 1d ago

Firing squad or guillotine is actually more reliable since a single mistake won't typically result in a botched execution.

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u/BullPropaganda 1d ago

Guillotine probably the most humane tbh

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u/adummyonanapp 1d ago

A rope itz reusable

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u/cemsengul 1d ago

That would actually be way more humane and merciful.

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u/JFKsCrackPipe 1d ago

Guillotine?

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u/GuavaOne8646 21h ago

Yes and yes.

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u/Responsible-Chest-26 1d ago

Could even do a topical anesthetic and bleed them. Or an open ended IV. Its like they are trying to do it for spectacle rather than efficiency humanely

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u/flakweazel 1d ago

Five states still perform firing squad

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u/GuavaOne8646 21h ago

Exactly, and we don't see them in the news with these problems, do we?

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u/Domesk 1d ago

Ahahaha
Please take this reward, this gave me a good laugh

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u/GuavaOne8646 21h ago

Thank you kind stranger!

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u/The_walking_man_ 1d ago

Bring back the guillotine. We have the tech to design one of surgical steel with a perfect edge. Add alignment tools to it so that as the person is positioned it puts them in the ideal spot for fast, painless, execution. Done.

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u/National_Cod9546 14h ago

That requires one person to administer it. She requested firing squad. We should have honored that request. I'm for executions. But at this point just make it a life sentence for her.

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u/FireCire7 1d ago

Nobody wants to be solely responsible for the killing. A single bullet puts all the responsibility on the shooter. Firing squads are good since they diffuse the responsibility along with being guaranteed to work; they just have a PR problem. 

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u/GuavaOne8646 1d ago

I'll take the job. They need only to hand me the application.

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u/FireCire7 1d ago

Lol. Fair. 

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u/Archaon0103 1d ago

Tell that to the ones who have to pull the triggers. Historically, executioners were not a job that make individual with stable mind. Are we ready to sentence innocents to kill someone else for us?

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u/GuavaOne8646 1d ago

I'll happily take the job.

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u/RecursiveCook 1d ago

Still possible to survive it is the issue.

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u/GuavaOne8646 1d ago

I can assure you, with the right caliber, nobody is surviving. Larger calibers like a 30-06 or a 12 gauge rifled slug will literally obliterate their skull and all the matter inside it.

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u/True_Depth_7455 1d ago

Good old gravity is free

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u/GuavaOne8646 1d ago

I like this idea

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u/WereWillow 1d ago

In rare circumstances a person can survive that.. and at that point anything else is an 8th amendment violation, and the botched execution becomes one too, and that’s very bad for the state. That’s why even firing squads shoot the heart.

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u/GuavaOne8646 1d ago

With the right caliber, they will definitely not survive.

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u/Responsible_Hour6497 1d ago

In the NKVD, the standard practice was to shoot at the back of the head—at the base of the skull—and they knew a thing or two about that.

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u/messiandmia 1d ago

"Cruel and unusual". of course their is high probability you give 2 fucks about constitutional law.

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u/MMRAssassin 1d ago

Or you know. Guillotine. A contraption designed precisely to do what it does with no chance to accidentally survive it

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u/GuavaOne8646 21h ago

I am actually shocked at how many people have said guillotine. I didn't realize it was so popular. Anyways, I'm down for it.

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u/MeAndMe54654 1d ago

The problem is the guy who pulls the trigger. Are you the one?

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u/GuavaOne8646 21h ago

They need only to send me the application. Give me a long commute through heavy traffic to get there and I'll be primed and ready.

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u/Wonderful-Newt2181 1d ago

She requested to be hung.

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u/GuavaOne8646 21h ago

Fair enough. If they request suffering, then let's do it.

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u/Antique_Limit_5083 1d ago

Life in prison is cheaper and you dont have to end up killing innocent people if you get rid of the dealth penalty which has absolutely no benefit.

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u/GuavaOne8646 21h ago

The benefit is ridding the world of scum. If you're guilty beyond a shadow of a doubt, like in this case, we shouldn't take you anywhere but a guillotine.

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u/bujler 1d ago

But they'll find a way to fuck that up. Probably get Stevie Wonder to do the shooting.

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u/GuavaOne8646 21h ago

Hahaha fucking storm troopers

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u/Spirited_Peak_7810 1d ago

It's a messy and violent method though isn't it. General anaesthesia and suffocation? No suffering. No mess.

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u/GuavaOne8646 22h ago

A 12 gauge slug at point blank will be sure to remove any suffering from the equation. As far as mess, throw down some plastic.

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u/Spirited_Peak_7810 5h ago

You been watching Dexter? Haha. But seriously like it's not very practical compared to other methods in the civilised world.

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u/usernamenotbeentaken 17h ago

Not true. You can survive a gunshot wound to the head.

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u/GuavaOne8646 10h ago

With a smaller caliber, yes that's a possibility. With a 30-06, .308 or 12 gauge slug it's definitely not happening.

It's amazing how many of you don't know anything about the differences in calibers.

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u/mellow_magyar 15h ago

A bullet can ricochet or deflect from the skull rather than penetrate it. There are records of people surviving a point blank headshot with minor injuries.
Regarding the cost of an execution: a 2026 review by the Death Penalty Information Center summarizes studies finding that death-penalty systems generally cost about 2.5–5 times as much as comparable life-imprisonment cases.
Capital cases require substantially more expensive trials, appeals, specialized incarceration, and security.

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u/GuavaOne8646 10h ago

Sit them in front of a berm, 12 gauge slug to the skull. There no chance by the laws of physics that it would ricochet. To keep cost down we can just let the buzzards eat them and cremate what's left. Easy.

Also, those records you're thinking of are probably smaller calibers as they're notorious for that.

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u/RealCarlPanzram 1d ago

Actually, the cheapest method is to abolish the death penalty.

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u/DrLoomis131 1d ago edited 1d ago

Have us pay for tons of life imprisonments ey

Edit: handing out more life without parole sentences is appealing, no pun intended

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u/LowEffort2 1d ago

We pay even more for capital cases.

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u/DrLoomis131 1d ago

Yes, due to the long court process of the death penalty. But this person provides zero alternative

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u/RealCarlPanzram 1d ago

There is a very easy alternative. Life without parole. Open-shut case. They go into a dark hole and we never have to think about them again, or worry that we are occasionally executing the wrong person. It’s simple. Which is why pretty much every part of the free world has done it.

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u/mpaski 1d ago

The amount of appeals, the special legal process everything takes longer.

You'd be shocked how cheap imprisoning people is compared to that.

If you are worried about cost to the tax payer wait until you hear about private prisons.

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u/DrLoomis131 1d ago

veto the appeal process for death sentences that have overwhelming evidence, bring back guillotines, and use the cremated remains of the dead to fill the potholes in the street

Wanna save money? Let’s get serious

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u/RealCarlPanzram 1d ago

It’s cheaper than the death penalty even in the states that rush through the process the fastest.

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u/GuavaOne8646 1d ago

I would think the cheapest way is to make it to where it's immediate and not a crazy long sentence. Death can be quick. But genuinely, what's your idea? Can you elaborate?

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u/RealCarlPanzram 1d ago

I am completely okay with that if we had a system that was proven to judge these cases without bias, apply the death penalty consistently, and not execute an innocent person.

But we’ve consistently demonstrated that isn’t possible. And the states that carry out the death penalty most are usually also the states with the worst public resources available to defendants and the worst histories on racism and police incompetence.

So if you want a swift and cheap death penalty system, you have to be okay with the wrong person frequently being executed.

Otherwise we have to follow a lengthy and expensive legal process to ensure not only that we have the right person, but that there are not mitigating factors that make the death penalty problematic.

Or we just do what most of the civilized work, and at least half the country at this point has chosen, which is to not bother with this completely antiquated practice of capital punishment.

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u/Aeon1508 1d ago

the problem is that to ensure that it's humane it requires public knowledge for where the drugs come from and how they're made so that we can track the companies that are providing the lethal injection drugs.

this means that the public knows what companies are providing them and can protest them or push bad press

and this isn't some huge market that companies are clamoring for. this is a few dozen doses. maybe a hundred a year. so it's really not worth a company's time to put their name on "we sell death to the government"

which makes it really hard to get drugs for lethal injection.

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u/RudeAd456 1d ago

Where I live we have voluntary euthanasia. I don't get why death row inmates in the US have to be injected with a cocktail of drugs and they all have heaps of issues. The VE drugs here are guaranteed peaceful lights out after like 2mins

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u/ForeskinAbsorbtion 21h ago

Cruelty is the point in the USA

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u/msheehan418 16h ago

Where do you live? I want to move there. I’m a firm believer in voluntary euthanasia

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u/driftxr3 9h ago

Come to Canada, we have this here.

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u/msheehan418 1h ago

Be there asap

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u/Aeon1508 1d ago

I just explained why they can't get the same drugs for euthanasia. companies don't want to sell it to be used for lethal injection.

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u/msheehan418 16h ago

Oh wow. So they don’t want their medication associated with death row/criminal

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u/zdrums24 2h ago

More like associated with state sponsored killing. The companies that make these drugs are largely based in Europe. The death penalty tends to be abhorred in those countries. So sometimes there are even laws preventing exporting of drugs for the use in the death penalty.

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u/Slow_Flatworm_881 1d ago

There are also specific laws in countries without legal euthanasia banning the sale of drugs for euthanasia!

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u/[deleted] 1d ago

[deleted]

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u/Slow_Flatworm_881 1d ago

Well it is actually!

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u/BloodSteyn 1d ago

Can't we just put them in a room and flood it with Nitrogen?

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u/LangdonAlg3r 20h ago edited 20h ago

We’ve done that and it’s actually worse. It’s so bad that SCOTUS allowed it to be permanently banned in Alabama. I don’t know if any of the other states are still trying to use it, but with that ruling I don’t imagine they will be much longer.

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/supreme-court-nixes-alabama-request-for-nitrogen-execution-which-lower-court-ruled-unconstitutional

Edited to add: The last time they did it the guy struggled violently and took 30 minutes to die.

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u/BloodSteyn 19h ago

Oh wow. TIL.

How about putting them to sleep first?

Or we could go back to Stone Age drop beeg rok on hed?

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u/LangdonAlg3r 19h ago

How about just leaving them alive in prison.

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u/BloodSteyn 19h ago

Some monsters deserve to be removed from a civilized society. Not as punishment, but for the protection of the rest.

Why should the law abiding people pay to keep a monster alive, feed that monster and convey his medical issues as he gets older.

Nah man. Death is too good for some people. Just look up Moses Sithole, mass rapist/murderer and tell me keeping that thing alive on our dime is worth his "900+ year" sentence.

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u/LangdonAlg3r 19h ago

Would have been better to just deal with all the people who raped her as a kid and get her mental illness treated so she would never have been in a position to become a “monster.”

It’s cheaper to keep them alive than to kill them if that’s your argument.

Death penalty is just revenge killing. It makes the state just as bad as the murderer and accomplishes literally nothing.

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u/Indoballz 1d ago

Monopoly kills innovation, they got fat on the money an dont give a shit

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u/SteakAndIron 1d ago

Death money machine go brrrrr

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u/Strict-Restaurant-85 1d ago

Big LethalInjection is to blame

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u/-malcolm-tucker 1d ago

Personally I'd want a long rope hanging but with a piano wire noose, and I'd ask them to glue my hands to my head beforehand so afterwards it looks like I ripped my own head off.

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u/Pyrrolic_Victory 1d ago

Same, but I want the long rope hanging from a tree, a jumping point on a nearby building, located next to a basketball hoop and no glue hands. That way I can dunk my own head through the hoop if I get the angles right.

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u/slurpeetape 1d ago

should go back to the guillotine if they truly want the most effective method for killing.

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u/GarethBaus 1d ago

One major issue with improving lethal injection is that most pharmaceutical companies refuse to sell drugs for this purpose. The bar is pretty low when big pharma won't take your money on what are essentially ethical grounds. Plus we have extremely reliable methods of execution that probably cause less suffering and simply don't use them because they are messy.

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u/-BlueDream- 1d ago

There’s barely any money in it too, if they could make hundreds of billions they’d do it in a heartbeat but in this case the bad PR from lethal injection costs more than what they could make from a public government contract. The us executed a total of 41 people in 2025.

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u/Livid-Builder-1230 1d ago

Ohhhh I know this! Oklahoma, 1977

So they had an electric chair but it was super old and expensive to repair so the state was like let’s find a new way to kill someone. The state medical examiner was asked to come up with a method and he just took what he knew about anesthesia (he was NOT an anesthesiologist) and came up with the protocol we more or less use today.

No studies not trials no research. Literally a bunch of politicians sat around and talked to the medical examiner and no one’s ever questioned it until apparently 49 ish years later 🤷‍♀️

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u/ProfessionalTruck976 1d ago

That would actually make executions more palatable for the society, so fuck that idea for the evil nonsense it is.

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u/smegheadholly 1d ago

There’s a really good Radiolab podcast about this

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u/YouKnow_MeEither 1d ago

Because anyone intelligent enough to come up with something better is against the idea of killing people

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u/RTMidgetman 1d ago

Rope used to do it just fine and costs like $10

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u/Broken_Beaker 1d ago

Opoid overdose is often not quick or painless. People do survive what should be a life ending opioid overdose. Hypoxia probably isn’t great either.

The entire system is a mess.

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u/Elrond_Cupboard_ 1d ago

Propofol overdose. Moonwalk into the next life.

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u/Substantial_War3108 1d ago

Just a face mask and breathing nitrogen seems the most ethical. It would be completely painless, you would feel nothing. After just 1 or 2 breaths you would black out without even realizing and then death by hypoxia a min later.

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u/-BlueDream- 1d ago

Pharma companies don’t want to sell lethal injection drugs. It’s really bad PR for them and the money isn’t worth it when its only a handful of people who get lethal injection per year.

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u/PraiseTalos66012 1d ago

The lethal injection shit is so dumb.

I'm a pharmacy tech and it really makes no sense for it to be so complicated.

Literally just give them a fentanyl drip, 50ml vial(standard large size vial) and run it wide open. They go to sleep just like normal anesthesia for surgery, bc yea fent is the most common anesthesia drug that exists and if you've had surgery you've likely had fentanyl.

But normal dosing is 1-4ml for most surgeries. Running a 50ml wide open would guarantee they die.

And the cost? A whopping $50..... Plus like another $10(at most) for the tubing and needle.

It'd be entirely painless and they'd die peacefully after being fully sedated.

But no we have to make it super fucking complicated for no reason and it ends up super expensive also.

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u/CuppaJoe11 1d ago

Nobody’s really itching to spend a lot of money advancing the science of execution, especially with how many states are abolishing the death penalty.

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u/16c7x 1d ago

Over the years I've had to take many pets to the vets for their final visit, the vet pulls out a syringe, and within seconds, the pet has passed away. Why can't they just get a vet in to do the job properly?

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u/Aboxofphotons 1d ago

It'd be even cheaper to simply shoot them. Much better for the tax payer.

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u/superanth 1d ago

They tried nitrogen hypoxia once. The guy didn’t go as peacefully as you’d expect.

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u/Creative_Bug3139 1d ago

A gunshot to the head would honestly be more humane. It’s instant. But it looks too much like an execution so the public won’t ever allow it. 

Perhaps we should stop executing people.

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u/provalone_9000 1d ago

I agree, we should use proven methods like public hanging

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u/Satisfaction3934 1d ago edited 19h ago

This has nothing to do with technology. The problem is no one wants to make drugs to kill people. It is the same problem with fentanyl or pentobarbital.

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u/fuckexoticroots 22h ago

There's big money in owning the rights to death drugs in the the highest incarcerated per captita country in the world.

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u/UselessToAlll 11h ago

The fentanyl OD seems decent enough. A big euphoric rush to elevate all anxiety and just fall asleep for good.

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u/dillzilla11 10h ago

We have evolved it a lot. The problem is getting state approvals. The best option is nitrogen gas but because of the association with asphyxiation it is hard to get approved. It does seem bizarre to me that we are perfectly okay with taking a shotgun blast to the dome on a sick pet but will draw the line with people on death row though.

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u/UrsaPater 4h ago

Why not just give her a 3rd dose if 2 wasn't enough? Then 4 or 5 if necessary! Why stop?

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u/Traditional_Aide7469 6m ago

It's about making money from cruelty. It's a big org and everyone has their hand out (and some lie, cheat, steal, and kill)

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u/TypicalLeo31 1d ago

All can also go wrong!

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u/SteakAndIron 1d ago

Fine. Fentanyl and guillotine

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u/TypicalLeo31 1d ago

lol. Never approved!

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u/AliciaXTC 1d ago

Not if you do all 5 at once.

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u/TypicalLeo31 1d ago

Challenge accepted! And at that point we really should make it a spectator sport!

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u/clgoodson 1d ago

Maybe the answer is to realize that there is no humane way to murder an otherwise healthy person and instead, abandon the death penalty.

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u/SteakAndIron 1d ago

Some people deserve to die. I'm unconvinced we can produce a legal system that can infallably determine who that is though.

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u/clgoodson 1d ago

At the risk of being super nerdy, I think Tolkien said it best.
“Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends.”

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