A death row prisoner whose planned execution on Thursday was suddenly halted became emotional when he learned that a federal court had ruled Alabama’s use of nitrogen gas violates the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment.Subscribe to read this story ad-free Get unlimited access to ad-free articles and exclusive content.“It’s like an expected sigh of relief in one aspect, and then you still got to stay and maintain your focus and continue to fight,” Jeffery Lee, who has been on death row for nearly three decades, told NBC News by phone Tuesday.He spoke from the William C.
Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore, Alabama, moments after a district court judge agreed to stop his execution.“Fear not, I am not finished, and just, you know, to me, my faith is everything,” Lee, 49, said.Jeffery Lee.Albama Dept.
of CorrectionsDespite the ruling, his fate remains uncertain: State Attorney General Steve Marshall has filed an appeal, likely sending the case up to the Supreme Court, which has previously sided with Alabama by allowing nitrogen executions to proceed after last-minute appeals.Marshall’s office declined to comment Wednesday.
Lee was scheduled to become the ninth person in the country put to death via nitrogen hypoxia, which was pioneered by Alabama in 2024 and entails breathing pure nitrogen through a mask while being denied oxygen.Seven of those executions took place in Alabama; one was carried out in Louisiana.
Alabama’s primary method of execution remains lethal injection, which it last carried out in April 2025, but sourcing the drugs has been difficult in the last several years.Lee filed a lawsuit challenging nitrogen use last August.During a three-day bench trial in February, U.S.
District Judge Emily Marks heard testimony that nitrogen executions cause “severe air hunger” for the condemned, leading to “extreme emotional distress, panic, anxiety, and fear.”“Indeed, many people find air hunger ‘worse than pain�...