Kruglova I.

From the second half of the 19th century in the United States, hanging began to be considered an inhumane method of the death penalty (if one can speak of execution as humane at all). The state authorities wanted to replace hanging with some other method that would be less painful and not cause public outrage. Here is an example of two executions that prompted the state authorities to reconsider the old customary method of punishment.

The two criminals were tried for different crimes and hanged on June 30, 1852. Black Jonas Williams was convicted of rape and murder, white woman Ann Hoag for the murder of her husband. A new technique of hanging was introduced, which involved the use of a counterweight that abruptly lifts the convict and breaks his neck. The black Williams died quickly, and the white woman, who maintained her innocence until her death, suffered for several minutes. The public considered this unfair. Especially considering the historical situation of that time.

Another example of execution: Roxalana Druce was hanged on the same new "humane" gallows on February 28, 1887. She suffered for 15 minutes. After that, the authorities were determined to make the execution more humane.

What were the difficulties of the main method of execution? The main problem was determining the fall distance needed for a quick death. The length of the rope had to be calculated according to the weight and height of the convict. If the rope is too short, then it will not be able to quickly break the neck. On a rope that is too long, the convict can suffer up to 45 minutes. Other difficulties were associated with tying a knot: this had to be done in a special way at the left ear. That is, all technical conditions must be met for a neck fracture to occur. And this is difficult to achieve for various reasons, up to the excitement of the executioner. The onset of a fracture also depends on the muscles of the convict. If he has strong neck muscles, then the process will be slow, especially since usually a person strains his neck muscles, trying to fight for life. The last moments of the struggle for life are due to the very instinct of preservation. Even knowing that it is necessary to relax the neck in order to die quickly, the convict will unconsciously strain it.

After much experimentation and research, by January 1890, the electric chair was invented.

On August 6, 1890, the first execution took place in the electric chair. The first to be executed was William Kemmler (pictured left). Kemmler was a merchant in Buffalo with an addiction to alcohol. He was very jealous, constantly suspected his beloved of treason and was afraid that she would run away from him with another. One night, after a night of drinking, it seemed to Kemmler that his girlfriend was planning to make an escape and was packing her things, although she had only done the cleaning. But Kemmler was angry and exhausted by his doubts and suspicions. He killed his girlfriend with an ax and immediately went to the neighbors to report his crime. He said: “I killed her. I had to do it. I did it on purpose. I'll take the rope for it." But after a short trial, Kemmler was sentenced to death using a new method of killing - the electric chair.

The convict was asked if Kemmler wanted to say anything before he died. He said the following: “Well gentlemen, I wish you good luck in this world. I think I'm going to a good place, and the papers were writing too much that didn't exist." The prison guard's hands shook as he tied the convict to a chair. Kemmler grumbled, “God, Warden, calm down. Do not rush". An electrode with a washcloth was attached to the convict's head. Another electrode was passed to the spine to open an unobstructed path for the current to flow through the body. The electrodes were wetted with saline. Sufficient voltage to quickly kill a person, as was established during the experiments, was 2000 volts. The switch to supply current to the chair was turned by Edwin Davies. He made the chair himself and carried out several tests (later he was called the "state electrician"). The current passed through the body of the convict for 17 seconds. Kemmler was shaking despite no belts; his face was filled with blood. When the current was turned off, Alfred Southwick (the Buffalo dentist who pioneered the idea of ​​electrocution) exclaimed, “This is the culmination of decades of work and research! From this day on, we live in a civilized world!” To his dismay, Kemmler was not dead. The order was immediately given to turn the system back on, but time had already been lost. The generator needed to be energized again. All this time, Kemmler groaned and gasped. The witnesses were horrified. The current went through the convict again. This time the current was applied for a full minute. Smoke rose from Kemmler's head, the room smelled of burnt flesh, and cracklings were heard. When the power was turned off, Kemler was dead.

The first execution in the electric chair showed the imperfection of this method, which was considered the most humane at that time. Was the electric chair a step towards civilization, as it was called after the invention?

The next executions took place in the spring of 1891. Four were executed for different crimes. The method of execution has been adjusted. The generator has become more powerful, the wires are thicker. The second electrode was connected not to the spine, but to the arm. These executions went more smoothly and the new method was accepted by public opinion. However, the search for a more humane method continued. Moreover, a broad abolitionist movement unfolded in the 20th century, and debates about the humanity of the death penalty continue in the United States to this day.

Sources:

1. Rob Gallagher. Northeast regional studies of the executions between 1607 and 1968 http://users.bestweb.net/~rg/execution/regional_studies_northeast.htm
2. History of Execution Methods in the U. S. Research from the Death Penalty Information Center. http://www.courttv.com/archive/national/death_penalty/history_dpenalty.html
3. MacLeod M. Condemned. http://www.crimelibrary.com/notorious_murders/not_guilty/chair/5.html
4. MacLeod M. Horrifying Mistakes. http://www.crimelibrary.com/notorious_murders/not_guilty/chair/6.html

Types and variations of the death penalty. Electric chair. December 11th, 2014

Hello dear!
Let's continue our conversation about the death penalty. You can see the previous part here:
Today we will talk about such a highly specialized type of fatal executions as an electric chair. Currently available only in US states: Alabama, Florida, South Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee and Virginia. Moreover, only in the latter this execution is practiced widely and practically without reservations. In the rest, either only as a last resort, or in the absence of an alternative (for example, the inability to quickly get the components of a deadly serum). Once this type of execution was also used in the Philippines, but since 1973 this practice has been discontinued.
Ideally, this type of punishment was planned as the most humane execution, but in practice, sometimes it does not always work out that way. From a medical point of view, death should occur as a result of cardiac arrest and respiratory paralysis after exposure to a condemned electrical current of great strength. That is, a current is supplied and the condemned does not have time to feel anything and dies calmly. But that's in theory...

That same thing...

An electric chair is a high-back chair with wooden armrests, usually on which special straps hang for rigid fixation. The arms are fastened on the armrests, the legs are in special clamps on the legs of the chair. After the offender is fixed on his voice, they put on a special hoop. Electrical contacts are connected to the hoop. Another pin is attached at the ankle usually to the right foot. Before execution, the convict shaves the hair on the top of his head and, if there is vegetation on his legs, also his ankle. A sponge impregnated with saline is inserted under the hoop, this is done in order to ensure minimal electrical contact resistance.
The current is supplied with an alternating voltage of 2700 V, the current strength is limited to 5 amperes, so that the body does not ignite. Actually, it's different...

Remember the movie The Green Mile?

The chair is activated by 2 switches - one of which is connected, the other is not - so that the executioners themselves do not know who exactly brought the "old smokehouse" (slang expression) into action. Something similar we have seen before in executions.

Dr. Albert Southwick

Formally speaking, the inventor of the electric chair is Buffalo dentist Albert Southwick, but in fact, Thomas Edison played a huge role in the promotion of this murder weapon and its advertising, which is why the electric chair is often called "edisonka" or "edisonina" (an analogy to the guillotine apparently ). The famous inventor and entrepreneur entered the fight against the Westinghouse empire, trying to prove the greater danger of alternating current (Westingau development) over its direct current. And so he helped create a chair with alternators.
The first person to be executed in this way is 30-year-old William Kemler, accused of killing his mistresses with an axe. The execution took place on August 6, 1890 in the prison of Auburn, New York. George Westinghouse, being a clear opponent of such an inhumane punishment, tried to “blow him off”, but it didn’t work out ....

The famous George Westinghouse

There is a lot of gossip about the humanity of this type of punishment. It may well be that the new equipment worked fine, but the old one .... A lot of unpleasant cases when a person was literally fried ...
The machine turns on once. Then a couple of minutes later the second, and the doctor records the death. This is how it should ideally be. In practice, however ... For the execution of John Louis Evans in April 1983 in the state of Alabama, it was necessary to apply a current of 1900 volts three times within 14 minutes before the death of the convict was ascertained. William Vandiver on October 16, 1985 in Indiana was executed only after the fifth discharge of current and died within 17 minutes
On July 4, 1989, also due to problems with an improperly connected electric chair, Horace Dunkens agonized for 19 minutes.

Willie Francis

The discharge followed the discharge, but every time the doctors stated that the convict was still alive. Well, the most amazing case, perhaps, happened with 18 (!) Years old murderer Willie Francis. They tried to execute him, but at first nothing happened, and then the tension disappeared. Therefore, he was again taken to the cell and executed a second time only after 6 days.

Apparently, accidentally injured Ethel and Julius Rosenberg

It only remains to add that the killer of President McKinley, Leon Czolgosz, was executed using the electric chair (we touched on this topic a little here.

Execution in the electric chair until recently was considered one of the most humane ways to kill criminals. However, over the years of application, it turned out that this type of execution is by no means completely painless, but, on the contrary, can cause terrible torment to the convict. What can happen to a person who gets into the electric chair?

Criminals began to be executed in the electric chair at the end of the 19th century, when supporters of a "progressive" society decided that previously existing types of executions, such as burning at the stake, hanging and beheading, were inhumane. From their point of view, the criminal should not suffer additionally in the process of execution: after all, he is already being deprived of the most precious thing - his life.

It is believed that the first model of the electric chair was invented in 1888 by Harold Brown, who worked for the Thomas Edison Company. According to others, the inventor of the electric chair was the dentist Albert Southwick.

The essence of the execution is this. The convict is shaved head and back of the leg. Then the torso and arms are firmly tied with straps to a chair made of dielectric, with a high back and armrests. Legs are fixed with special clamps. At first, the criminals were blindfolded, then they began to put a hood on their heads, and more recently, a special mask. One electrode is attached to the head, on which the helmet is put on, the other to the leg. The executioner turns on the switch button, which passes through the body an alternating current with a power of up to 5 amperes and a voltage of 1700 to 2400 volts. An execution usually takes about two minutes. Two discharges are given, each is switched on for one minute, the interval between them is 10 seconds. Death, which should occur from cardiac arrest, is mandatory recorded by the doctor.

For the first time this method of execution was applied on August 6, 1890 in the Auburn prison of the US state of New York to William Kemmler, convicted of the murder of his mistress Tilly Zeigler.

Up to now, more than 4,000 people have been executed in this way in the United States. Also, a similar type of execution was used in the Philippines. The communist spouses Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, who worked for Soviet intelligence, also ended their lives in the electric chair.

"False" procedure

It was assumed that when an electric current was passed through the body, a person would die immediately. But this did not always happen. Often, eyewitnesses had to observe how people put in an electric chair convulsed, bit their tongues, foam and blood came out of their mouths, their eyes popped out of their sockets, involuntary emptying of the intestines and bladder occurred. Some uttered piercing cries during the execution ... Almost always, after the discharge was applied, a light smoke began to go from the skin and hair of the convict. There have also been cases when a person sitting in an electric chair caught fire and exploded in the head. Quite often, the burnt skin "glued" to the belts and the seat. The bodies of the executed were, as a rule, so hot that it was impossible to touch them, and then the "aroma" of burnt human flesh hovered in the room for a long time.

One of the protocols describes an episode when a convict was exposed to a discharge of 2450 volts for 15 seconds, but a quarter of an hour after the procedure, he was still alive. As a result, the execution had to be repeated three more times, until the offender finally died. The last time, his eyeballs even melted.

In 1985, William Vandiver was electrocuted five times in Indiana. It took 17 minutes to kill him.

According to experts, when exposed to such a high voltage, the human body, including the brain and other internal organs, is literally fried alive. Even if death occurs quickly enough, at least a person feels the strongest muscle spasm throughout the body, as well as acute pain at the points of contact with the skin of the electrodes. This is usually followed by loss of consciousness. Here is the memoir of one of the survivors: “There was a taste of cold peanut butter in my mouth. I felt my head and left leg burning, so I tried with all my might to break free from the bonds. 17-year-old Willie Francis, who sat in the electric chair in 1947, shouted: “Turn it off! Let me breathe!"

Repeatedly, the execution became painful as a result of various failures and malfunctions. So, on May 4, 1990, when the criminal Jesse D. Tafero was executed, a synthetic gasket under the helmet ignited, and the convict received third or fourth degree burns. A similar thing happened on March 25, 1997 with Pedro Medina. In both cases, the current had to be turned on several times. In total, the execution procedure took 6-7 minutes, so it could not be called quick and painless.

The story of the murderer of the whole family, Allen Lee Davis, caused a great resonance, to whom not only his mouth (instead of a gag), but also his nose was sealed with a leather tape before execution. In the end, he suffocated.

Chair or injection?

Over time, it became clear that the "humane" execution is in fact often a painful torture, and its use was limited. True, some people believe that the point here is not at all in humanity, but in the high cost of the procedure.

Currently, electric chair execution is used only in six US states - Alabama, Florida, South Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee and Virginia. Moreover, the convict is offered a choice - an electric chair or a lethal injection. The last time the above-mentioned measure was applied on January 16, 2013 in Virginia to Robert Gleason, who deliberately killed two of his cellmates in order to have his life sentence commuted to a death sentence.

In addition, there is a law in the USA: if after the third category the sentenced person survives, then he receives a pardon: they say, it means that this is the will of God ...

The electric chair is no longer considered the most humane way to carry out death sentences.

The unsuccessful attempt to execute an American sentenced to death Romel Brum in September 2009 caused a rather large wave of protests against the death penalty. It's no joke - they failed to give him a lethal injection 18 times in a row. However, this is far from an isolated case: from time to time, the technology for carrying out death sentences fails, and as a result, some convicts die in terrible agony. Pravo.Ru talks about the most resonant cases from American practice.

Romel Broom: failed execution attempt

Romel Broome, convicted in 1984 of the rape and murder of a 14-year-old girl (documents in this case are available), had been waiting for the execution of the death sentence for almost 25 years. All this time he spent in a prison in Lucasville, Ohio. Time X for him came at 14.00 on September 15, 2009 - on this day, the doctors were supposed to inject the criminal with a lethal injection.

The forensic doctors tried to give Broom an injection at exactly the right time. However, they did not succeed: instead of a vein, the needle hit the muscle. Several subsequent attempts also did not bring results: the veins on the hands of the convict seemed to have disappeared. The needle of the syringe broke, and Broom's hands literally began to swell before his eyes. The 53-year-old criminal screamed in pain.

The nurses who came to the rescue tried to remove the tumors with wet compresses, while the doctors continued to try to give an injection. The execution lasted over two hours. Broom began to writhe in pain. His swollen hands were punctured, but death still did not come. The prison authorities were forced to stop the execution and appeal to the governor of the state. He appointed a reprieve.

Cases like this have repeatedly ignited a public discussion about the permissibility of the death penalty and the technique of its execution. However, not all suicide bombers, whose cases spurred debate, were "lucky" like Broom. The vast majority of them died, if not on the first, then on the second attempt.

Willy Francis: you can be executed twice

The last person to appear twice before the executioners before Broome was 17-year-old African American Willie Francis. A court in Louisiana sentenced him to the electric chair for killing his employer. Human rights activists began to protest even at the stage of consideration of the case: they were embarrassed that the court dealing with this crime consisted entirely of white Americans. However, the protests had no effect: Francis was sentenced to death.

When the convict was put on an electric chair and the current was turned on, death did not occur. "Take off your hood, let me breathe! I'm alive!" shouted Francis. The execution was stopped. Despite the fact that human rights activists tried to use the incident to overturn the sentence (some even referred to "providence that does not allow the innocent to die"), a year later, Francis again sat on the electric chair: the Supreme Court decided that the second procedure was not contrary to the constitution. The second time everything went without a hitch.

The electric chair did not always justify the hopes for a humane execution

In 1889, the state of New York passed a law according to which the execution of criminals should be carried out only in the electric chair. Under pressure from the public, the authorities recognized that death by electric discharge was much more humane than the gallows used hitherto. But the very first execution using the new technology brought the convict even greater torment than death in a noose: William Kemmler, who was executed on August 6, 1890, convulsed for several minutes. Death did not come immediately, because the guards did not calculate the voltage. As a result, more than twenty witnesses were forced to watch as Kemmler was literally roasted alive. The journalists who were present at the execution wrote that the new "death machine" should be improved, otherwise unpleasant incidents in the future are inevitable.

But even modern technology of execution in the electric chair does not guarantee failures. In April 1983, during the execution of John Evans in Alabama, there was a malfunction with the electrodes. The convict died in the electric chair only on the third attempt, when the entire room where the execution took place was saturated with the smell of burning flesh. A few years later, the authorities of the city of Atmore in the same Alabama needed to give an electric shock twice in order to kill Horace Franklin Dunkins. "Terrible execution" lasted a full 19 minutes, wrote The New York Times.

Allen Lee Davis: "the man tortured to death by the citizens of Florida"

The real scandal caused the execution of Allen Lee Davis in 1999 in Florida. The offender weighed 130 kilograms, and his lawyer warned the authorities that death in the electric chair for a person of this weight could turn into torture. And so it happened: in the photographs of the execution of Davis, employees of the US Supreme Court saw "a man who was tortured to death by the citizens of Florida." According to witnesses, during the execution, Davis screamed loudly in pain, and blood gushed from his chest. The photo clearly shows that the face of the criminal turned blue, and the body was very swollen.

From the electric chair to lethal injections

Today, only Nebraska executes in the US in the electric chair. Other American states have been killing criminals by lethal injection since the late 1980s. It is generally accepted that this is a more humane way. However, the risk that the last minutes of the life of the executed person will become the most painful for him also exists when using injections. The painkiller given to the condemned at the same time as the lethal injection lasts no more than 15 minutes, and after the correct dose of the lethal drug is administered, at least 9 minutes elapse before death. However, the real time limits of these "no more" and "at least" depend on the individual characteristics of the organism, and it is impossible to exclude the possibility of death after the effect of painkillers ceases.

But for now, the United States, unlike European countries, is not going to remove the death penalty from the arsenal of punishments. As for the second attempt to execute Romel Brum, it is not yet clear whether there will be one. On the one hand, there are voices against, however, on the other hand, in 1946, in the case of Willie Francis, American justice already answered the question of whether it is possible to execute twice.

Let's start with the fact that the 30-year-old native of Philadelphia William Kemmler he was a bit of a bastard in his own right. True, in our time he would certainly complain about family circumstances. After all, both of his parents are immigrants from Germany, drunken alcoholics. William left school at the age of 10, he worked in a butcher's shop: child labor was then the norm. After burying his father and mother, he peddled, saved up money, bought a horse and a wagon. Constantly got involved in fights and drank. When he didn’t drink and didn’t fight in a bar, he beat his, as they say now, “common-law wife” Matilda Ziegler. On March 29, 1889, he and Matilda quarreled over the money that William was enthusiastically drinking. Then Kemmler took a hatchet, designed for chopping logs into wood chips for the hearth, and hit Ziegler with all his might on the head. The woman died instantly. Seeing William leaving his house in blood, one of the neighbors ran to the police: law enforcement officials arrested the killer at the crime scene. The trial took place in May. The evidence was there, and the criminal did not deny it: on August 13, 1889, Kemmler was sentenced to death. Presumably, he was supposed to be hanged, but the executioner who carried out the execution first left for a “part-time job” in another state, and then fell ill. Therefore, they decided to execute the murderer with a fashionable invention: in an electric chair.

"Good" replacement of the gallows

You will be surprised, but this method of killing criminals was initially positioned as ... "extremely humane." Previously, murderers in the United States were sentenced to the gallows, there were not enough skilled executioners: often a person suffered before death on a rope for 10-15 minutes. It looked, delicately speaking, not very beautiful. Therefore, in American society, there have long been sluggish discussions about how exactly the execution should be softer.

In 1881 dentist Albert Southwick witnessed a shocking incident: a drunk port loader accidentally touched the contacts of an electric generator. Of course, he was killed on the spot. Believing that such a death was instantaneous and painless, Southwick turned to his friend, Senator David McMillan and proposed to replace the hanging with an electric current, using a "special device". This information got into the newspapers, and journalists, by analogy with the dental chair, dubbed the design the "electric chair". The Senate created a commission to study the issue, and inventor Thomas Edison, ardently supporting the new kind of "capital measure", conducted ruthless experiments on cats and dogs, proving: look, they are killed by electric current in one second.

As a result, Southwick's proposal was approved: on January 1, 1889, the "Electric Execution Law" came into force in the state of New York. True, they did not yet know exactly how they should be executed: in the heat of the moment they were going to put the criminal up to his neck in a tank of water and lower the wires there. But this option was recognized as unaesthetic. The first model of the electric chair was made by a 44-year-old Edwin Davis, a modest employee of the Auburn prison: it was he who was destined to work as the first "electric executioner", who sent 240 people to the next world. Meanwhile, the famous engineer George Westinghouse, who developed a system for supplying consumers with electricity on alternating current. He hired the best lawyers he could find for William Kemmler: appeals fell one after another. Westinghouse refused to supply the prisons with electricity generators, but the Auburn prison staff proved that the sleight-of-hand was clever by purchasing these devices through nominees. Lawyers foaming at the mouth argued that the electric chair is a "cruel and unusual punishment" prohibited by the Eighth Amendment to the US Constitution. They clearly could get a commutation of the sentence, but the convicted William Kemmler behaved stupidly: he boasted that he had hacked to death his mistress, and gladly told the details. Therefore, his fate was sealed.

"The dead man is still breathing!"

On August 6, 1890, the electric chair was installed in Auburn Prison. William Kemmler was roused at 5:00 a.m. He quickly dressed in a smart suit and tie. After a hearty breakfast and prayer in the presence of a priest, the barber shaved William's crown. At 6:38 a.m., Kemmler entered the room where 17 witnesses were already seated and said: “Gentlemen, I wish you all good luck. I believe I'm heading to a great place, and I'm ready to be transported there." William sat down on a chair, but he was ordered to get up: it was necessary to cut a hole in the suit in order to pass an electric wire. Then the condemned man was tied to the armrests and a metal bowl was lowered to the top of his head. “Please do it right,” the killer said. - I'm not in a hurry". He was calm and did not resist. Perhaps he did not believe: is it really so easy to kill with this unknown device? The overseer muttered a farewell, and Davis, the electro-executioner, turned on the current. The idyll ended immediately.

Kemmler was struck by a discharge of 1,000 volts: electricity was released for 17 seconds. Then the "breaker" was removed to its previous position, and those present at the execution neurologist Eduard Spitska publicly declared: the criminal is dead. “Yes, where is it! witnesses shouted from the side. Look, he's still breathing! The neurologist yelled at Davis, "Turn the current back on, quick!" The second attempt (the norm was doubled: 2,000 volts) led to a situation comparable to a horror movie: the blood vessels on the hands of the criminal burst, flooding the floor around with blood, his head began to smoke, the room was filled with the smell of burning flesh (in any case, witnesses reported that incidents). Kemmler groaned loudly. Several people, holding back their nausea, tried to leave the room, but the door was locked. William Kemmler died only 8 minutes after the start of the execution. A New York Times reporter who was present at the "electric execution" later wrote in an article: "Excuse me, is this what you call humanity?! Such things are much worse than hanging.” George Westinghouse, commenting on the details of Kemmler's murder, said: "Honestly, it would be better if he was hacked to death with an axe." Everyone was sure that this would not happen again.

Kemmler's execution, eyewitness sketch. Photo: Public Domain

Everything in the style of Chernomyrdin

However, in 1896 the electric chair was allowed in Ohio, in 1898 in Massachusetts, in 1906 in New Jersey, and in 1910 in North Carolina. Electrocution has become the most popular form of execution in the United States. Over the next hundred years, 4,300 people were deprived of their lives in this way, including serial killers, gangsters, and spouses. Rosenberg accused of spying for the USSR. Now the electric chair as a "higher measure" remains in 8 states, but only if the person sentenced to death himself chooses this option of transition to another world. The last person to be executed by electricity remains Robert Gleason who sat down on a chair on January 16, 2013 in Virginia. It just so happened: the invention, proposed as “humane and painless”, remained brutal and frightening in people’s memory for many decades. They intimidated criminals. You can remember the words of the unforgettable Viktor Stepanovich Chernomyrdin: "We wanted the best, but it turned out as always."