The Sunday Tulsa World reported, "Inside Oklahoma's execution chamber: What happens in the small, dark room," by Ziva Branstetter. Here's the beginning of this lengthy report:
The room where Oklahoma’s three executioners have carried out their lethal duties since 1992 is the size of a walk-in closet and so dimly lit they are provided a flashlight to see, according to court records.
Cleaning supplies have been stored in the “drug room,” where executioners administer the lethal drugs. A small window in the door provides only a partial view of the inmate being executed. If something goes wrong, the executioners stick colored pencils through holes in the drug room wall to communicate with the doctor and others in the death chamber.
Depositions by Department of Corrections officials and affidavits by attorneys who toured death row at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary describe in detail the cramped, dark and isolated conditions inside the execution chamber. The documents are part of past legal challenges to the state’s lethal injection process.
The article also includes these links:
Read attorney Janet Chesley’s account of visiting the chamber in 2006.
"Oklahoma Lawmakers To Consider Execution By Gas," is the AP report, via KOTV-TV.
Oklahoma would become the first state to execute condemned inmates using nitrogen gas to asphyxiate them under a proposal that will be presented next week to a legislative committee.
Oklahoma City Republican Rep. Mike Christian says he will unveil details of the plan Tuesday during an interim study of the House Judiciary Committee and that he plans to introduce a bill next year.
And:
Christian initially proposed the use of a firing squad, but said nitrogen asphyxiation would be painless and easier to carry out.
Louisiana is also exploring the possibility of using nitrogen in a gas chamber. Related posts are in the gas chamber category inex.
"Death row inmate worries he’ll suffer a sloppy execution," is by Janelle Stecklein of CNHI News Service, via the Muskogee Daily Phoenix.
Since July, Richard Glossip has been listening to renovations inside the Oklahoma State Penitentiary. The noise is a constant reminder that his days are numbered.
Glossip, 51, is scheduled to be the second inmate executed under new procedures for lethal injections in Oklahoma, and in a newly renovated chamber.
Convicted in a murder-for-hire plot, he lives on death row in a small cell that he says is beneath the execution chamber.
Earlier coverage from Oklahoma begins at the link.
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