Alan Eugene Miller: Alabama has executed the second inmate known to have died from nitrogen gas

CNN
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Alan Eugene Miller was executed Thursday evening in Alabama, state officials said. This makes him the second prisoner known to have died from nitrogen hypoxia, a controversial method that critics say amounts to torture.

Miller, 59, sentenced to death in 2000 for the 1999 killings of three men, was pronounced dead at a prison in Atmore, Alabama, at 6:38 p.m. Alabama Department of Corrections Commissioner John Hamm said at a news conference.

Miller shook and trembled on a stretcher for about two minutes, his body jerking intermittently against the restraints, according to The Associated Press, where a reporter observed the procedure. The shaking and shaking were followed by about six minutes of regular, panting breathing before he became still, the AP reported.

“I didn’t do anything to be in here,” Miller said in his final words, which were at times muffled by a mask covering his face from forehead to chin, according to the AP.

Miller was fitted with the mask during the procedure, during which nitrogen gas flowed for about 15 minutes, Hamm said. When asked by a reporter, Hamm confirmed the two-minute concussion that he said was to be expected.

“Involuntary body movements occur because the body no longer has oxygen. This is nothing we didn’t expect,” Hamm said at the press conference.

“Everything went according to plan and according to our protocol, so it went exactly as we planned,” Hamm said.

At some point, a correctional officer had to adjust Miller's mask, Hamm confirmed in response to a reporter's question. “It’s just about making sure the mask fits,” Hamm said.

“Tonight, justice was finally served for these three victims through the inmate’s chosen method of execution,” Alabama Governor Kay Ivey said in a news release. “His actions were not insane, but pure evil. Three families were forever changed by his heinous crimes, and I pray they can find comfort all these years later.”

Miller's execution came after a years-long chain of events surrounding the manner in which he was to be executed: He initially requested death by nitrogen hypoxia, but the state said it was unwilling to use that method and then tried to go through with it to execute a lethal injection in September 2022. However, that attempt was aborted because state officials said they were unable to access Miller's veins before the execution order expired.

The state then agreed not to execute Miller using any method other than nitrogen hypoxia. But then earlier this year, Alabama executed Kenneth Smith by nitrogen hypoxia, believed to be the first execution by that method. Witnesses said Smith shook and writhed on the stretcher for minutes before he died.

Miller then challenged the state's nitrogen hypoxia protocol in a federal lawsuit, claiming it could cause him undue suffering and thereby violate his Eighth Amendment protection from cruel and unusual punishment. However, the lawsuit was settled last month.

The terms of the settlement were confidential, although Attorney General Steve Marshall cited them as evidence that Alabama's nitrogen gas method of execution is constitutional.

“The resolution of this case confirms that Alabama’s nitrogen hypoxia system is reliable and humane,” Marshall said in August.

Proponents of the nitrogen hypoxia method of execution, in which oxygen inhaled by an inmate is replaced with 100% nitrogen, say a person would likely lose consciousness shortly after the procedure begins, making it more humane than other methods of execution. But doctors said they couldn't say exactly if and when a person would lose consciousness when exposed to high concentrations of nitrogen gas.

CNN has repeatedly reached out to Miller's attorneys for comment on his settled lawsuit and execution.

On Thursday, in the hours before the execution, Miller had nine visitors and ate a final meal of hamburger steak, baked potatoes and French fries, the Alabama Department of Corrections said.

Miller has been facing the end of his life for more than two decades. He was sentenced to death in 2000 for the 1999 murders of Lee Holdbrooks, Scott Yancy and Terry Lee Jarvis.

Miller had worked with each of the victims and was upset when he believed the three had “spread rumors about him,” according to a statement from the Alabama Attorney General's Office.

According to court documents, Miller shot and killed two of the three men at Ferguson Enterprises in Pelham, Alabama, on the morning of August 5, 1999.

“I'm tired of people spreading rumors about me,” Miller said, armed with a handgun, as he left his employer's office, court documents say.

According to court documents, Yancy was shot three times and was unable to move after the first shot “passed through his groin and struck his spine, paralyzing him.”

Holdbrooks was shot six times and tried to escape down a hallway before Miller shot him in the head, “causing him to die in a pool of blood,” the documents say.

After killing Holdbrooks and Yancy, Miller went to his former employer, Post Airgas, where Jarvis worked.

Miller came in and said, “Hey, I heard you've been spreading rumors about me.”

Jarvis responded that he had not spread rumors about Miller, but moments later, Miller shot Jarvis “multiple times.”

Miller was later captured on the highway, court documents say, with “a Glock pistol with one round in the chamber and 11 rounds in the ammunition magazine.”

A forensic psychiatrist who testified in Miller's defense determined that he was mentally ill and suffered from a delusional disorder, leading him to believe that the victims were spreading rumors about him. However, the psychiatrist concluded that Miller's mental illness did not meet the standards for an insanity defense in Alabama.

“I feel like it's taken way too long to get here,” Tara Barnes, Holdbrooks' widow, told CNN on Tuesday.

CNN has attempted to reach family members of Yancy and Jarvis.

In September 2022, Alabama officials attempted to execute Miller by lethal injection but failed because they were unable to access his veins within the required time frame.

Miller was scheduled to be executed by lethal injection after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling overturned a lower court injunction in a long-running dispute over whether he would die by that method or by nitrogen hypoxia.

Before that first attempt, Miller and his lawyers had fought for him to be executed by nitrogen gas, a method he had previously chosen but which the state was unwilling to use.

After the failed attempt, Miller was sent back to death row.

Miller and his attorneys filed their lawsuit challenging the state's nitrogen hypoxia protocol after it was first used in Smith's execution.

Smith was sentenced to death for his role in a contract killing in 1988 and, like Miller, had previously survived a failed execution attempt by lethal injection in 2022.

Nitrogen gas death involves forcing an inmate to inhale 100% nitrogen gas, depriving them of the oxygen they need to survive. However, death by nitrogen gas has been criticized as experts said it could cause excessive pain or even torture.

During Smith's execution earlier this year, he appeared to be conscious for “several minutes” and afterward “he shook and writhed on a stretcher for two minutes,” the media report said.

Several minutes of deep breathing followed before his breathing slowed “until it was no longer noticeable to media witnesses,” the media witness report said.

“Obviously it wasn't the instant, painless death they had promised,” said Dr. Jonathan Groner, professor of surgery at The Ohio State University College of Medicine, told CNN last week. “There’s a lot of evidence that it wasn’t good and it wasn’t pleasant.”

United Nations experts “unequivocally condemned” Smith's execution and use of nitrogen gas inhalation, saying in a statement it was “nothing less than state-sanctioned torture.”

“The first experimental use in humans of an execution method that has been shown to cause suffering in animals is simply outrageous,” the UN experts said.

“The theory is that if you just get rid of all the oxygen and just breathe in pure nitrogen, you don't feel that intense pressure like you're holding your breath, right? That’s not really how it works,” said Groner, who has studied the death penalty for more than two decades.

While Alabama is the only state that has put this method of execution to the test, it is not the only state that has adopted the use of the procedure. According to the Death Penalty Information Center, Louisiana, Oklahoma and Mississippi have also approved death by nitrogen hypoxia.

CNN's Dakin Andone and Lauren Mascarenhas contributed to this report