Foreign News
Kenneth Eugene Smith faces first nitrogen execution in US after losing last-minute appeals
An Alabama death row inmate is expected to become the first person in the US to be executed with nitrogen gas, after losing last-minute appeals.
The US Supreme Court and a lower appeals court declined to block what Kenneth Eugene Smith’s lawyers called a “cruel and unusual” punishment.
Opponents say using nitrogen could cause unnecessary suffering, and a leak could harm people present in the room.
Smith, 58, was convicted in 1989 of murdering Elizabeth Sennett.
Alabama has 30 hours to carry out the execution, which involves pumping nitrogen gas through a mask, from Thursday at 0600 GMT (0100 ET).
He told the BBC earlier this week that the wait felt like torture.
Smith would be the first person to be put to death by this method in the US and, according to the Death Penalty Information Center, anywhere in the world.
Lawyers for the inmate, who has been on death row since 1996, told the BBC on Wednesday night that they were lodging another appeal to the nation’s top court in the hope of a last minute reprieve.
Breathing pure nitrogen without oxygen causes the cells to break down and leads to death. Alabama said in a court filing that they expect him to lose consciousness within seconds and die in a matter of minutes. But its use has been denounced by some medical professionals, who warn it could cause a range of catastrophic mishaps, ranging from violent convulsions to survival in a vegetative state.
Alabama and two other US states have approved the use of nitrogen hypoxia as an alternative method of execution because the drugs used in lethal injections have become more difficult to find, contributing to a fall in the number of executions nationally.
Alabama already tried to execute Smith by lethal injection two years ago but were unable to raise a vein before the state’s death warrant expired.
Smith was one of two men convicted of murdering 45-year-old Sennett in a $1,000 (£790) killing-for-hire in March 1988. She was beaten with a fireplace implement and stabbed in the chest and neck, and her death was staged to look like a home invasion and burglary.
Her husband Charles Sennett, a debt-ridden preacher, had orchestrated the scheme to collect insurance money. He killed himself as investigators closed in. Smith’s fellow hitman, John Forrest Parker, was executed in 2010.
At his trial Smith admitted to being present when the victim was killed, but said he did not take part in the attack.
The UN’s High Commissioner for Human Rights has said gassing Smith could amount to torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, and called for a halt. Smith’s lawyers lodged a challenge with the Supreme Court, arguing that putting convicts through multiple execution attempts violates the Eighth Amendment of the US Constitution, which protects against “cruel and unusual” punishment.
On Wednesday, the justices declined to hear the appeal and denied his request to halt the execution. No justice publicly dissented from the ruling.
Smith also made a separate legal challenge to the lower 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals, where he contested the legality of Alabama’s nitrogen gas protocol. But that court also rejected the inmate’s request for an injunction in a ruling on Wednesday evening.
Smith’s lawyers said they would again appeal to the Supreme Court.
His legal team argue the nitrogen gas method is “recently released and untested”, leaving him at risk of choking on his own vomit.
State Attorney General Steve Marshall previously called it “perhaps the most humane method of execution ever devised”.
Smith’s spiritual adviser, Reverend Jeff Hood, will be present in the room when the execution happens. He told the BBC he believes he will be in danger if the nitrogen leaks.
On Wednesday, prison officials escorted Rev Hood for a “walk-through” of the execution chamber, as required by Alabama’s execution protocol.
He told the BBC afterwards that he saw oxygen-level meters unplugged on a ledge inside the room, which he described as “unbelievably disturbing, it feels like you are at the centre of evil”.
“I asked ‘what’s the safety plan?’ and they said they didn’t want to get into it, they couldn’t get into it,” he said. “Once again we’re back at this place of having to rely on these people who have botched three executions in the last few years, he said. “It’s absolutely a terrifying thing to think that your life hangs in the balance with these guys”.
Rev Hood said he had requested that Alabama’s Governor Kay Ivey be present in the chamber during the execution to demonstrate her confidence in its safety, but had not received a response. “We have somebody who is championing this type of execution in the governor and yet she is unwilling to get her hands dirty,” he said.
The BBC has approached Ms Ivey’s office for comment regarding this and the latest accusations over safety.
Alabama has one of the highest per capita execution rates in the US and has 165 people currently on death row.
Since 2018, the state has been responsible for three botched attempts at lethal injection in which the condemned inmates survived.
The failures led to an internal review that largely placed blame on the prisoners themselves.
(BBC)
Australian authorities are euthanising about 90 false killer whales which survived a mass stranding on a remote beach in Tasmania.
A team of experts at the site said complex conditions have made it impossible to save them.
They are part of a pod of 157 whales that had beached near Arthur River, in the island’s north west. The rest had died shortly after the stranding.
Tasmania has seen a series of mass whale strandings in recent years – including the country’s worst-ever in 2020 – but false killer whales haven’t mass stranded there in over 50 years.
False killer whales are technically one of world’s largest dolphin species, like their orca namesakes. They can grow up to 6m (19ft) and weigh 1.5 tonnes.
Authorities on Wednesday said the pod had been stranded at the site for 24 to 48 hours, and the surviving animals were already under extreme stress.
Local resident Jocelyn Flint told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation she had travelled to the site on Wednesday morning after her son noticed the pod while out shark fishing overnight.
“There are babies… There’s just families of them. Their eyes are open, they’re looking at me, like ‘help’.”
“It’s just absolutely horrific.”
The site – about 300km (186 miles) from the city of Launceston – is extremely difficult to access and transport any rescue equipment to, marine biologist Kris Carlyon told media.
“This is possibly the trickiest location I’ve seen in 16 years of doing this role in Tasmania,” he said.
“We’re talking a very rough, steep, single lane road into the site. We can get four-wheel drives in there, but not a lot else.”
Rough conditions meant returning the animals to the sea at the location they stranded was impossible, so an expert team tried to relocate two and refloat them, but were unsuccessful.
“The animals just can’t get past the break to get out. They just keep turning around and coming back towards the beach,” said Shelley Graham, from Tasmania’s Parks and Wildlife Service.
With conditions for the next two days forecast to be similar, expert wildlife veterinarians made the “tough” and “confronting” decision to euthanise the remaining whales.
“The longer these animals are out stranded, the longer they are suffering. All alternative options have been unsuccessful, euthanasia is always a last resort,” Dr Carlyon said.
That grim task – which involves shooting the animals – is expected to begin on Wednesday but continue on Thursday.
Authorities are still working out how to dispose of the carcasses. The site has important cultural heritage for Aboriginal people so a department spokesperson earlier suggested “it may be a case of… letting nature run its course”.
Authorities have asked members of the public to avoid the site, with bushfires burning nearby and limited road access.
More than 80% of Australian whale strandings take place in Tasmania – often on its west coast.
Around 40 pilot whales were stranded further south at Macquarie Harbour in 2020 and about 350 of them died despite rescue efforts. Another 200 became standed in the same harbour in 2022.
Whales are highly social mammals and are well known for stranding in groups because they travel in large, close-knit communities which rely on constant communication.
There are a range of theories for why beachings occur. Some experts say the animals can become disoriented after following fish they hunt to the shore.
Others believe that one individual can mistakenly lead whole groups to shore.
[BBC]
Pope Francis has developed pneumonia in both his lungs and his condition remains “complex”, the Vatican says.
The 88-year-old has been suffering from a respiratory infection for more than a week and was admitted to Rome’s Gemelli hospital on Friday.
“The follow-up chest CT scan which the Holy Father underwent this afternoon… demonstrated the onset of bilateral pneumonia, which required additional drug therapy,” the Vatican said.
It said lab tests, a chest X-ray and the Pope’s clinical condition “continue to present a complex picture”.
Despite this, the Vatican said the pontiff remained in “good spirits” and spent the day “reading, resting and praying”.
Pope Francis also expressed his gratitude to well-wishers and asked them to “pray for him”.
Before his admission last week, the Pope had bronchitis symptoms for several days and had delegated officials to read prepared speeches at events.
He had been due to lead several events over the weekend for the 2025 Catholic Holy Year which runs through to next January, however all public events on the Pope’s calendar have been cancelled through to Sunday.
On Monday, the Vatican said that doctors had changed the Pope’s drug therapy for the second time during his hospital stay to tackle what at the time was thought to be a “polymicrobial infection of the respiratory tract”.
The Pope is especially prone to lung infections due to developing pleurisy as an adult and having part of one of his lungs removed at age 21.
During his 12 years as leader of the Roman Catholic church, the Argentine has been hospitalised several times including in March 2023 when he spent three nights in hospital with bronchitis.
[BBC]
The US government is trying to bring back nuclear safety employees it fired on Thursday, but is struggling to let them know they should return to work, NBC News has reported.
The National Nuclear Security Administration workers were among hundreds of employees in the energy department who received termination letters.
An email obtained by NBC said the letters for some NNSA employees “are being rescinded, but we do not have a good way to get in touch with those personnel”.
The terminations are part of massive effort by President Donald Trump to slash the ranks of the federal workforce, a project he began on his first day in office, less than a month ago.
Last week, nearly 10,000 federal workers were let go, according to multiple US outlets.
That figure was in addition to the estimated 75,000 workers who have accepted an offer from the White House to leave voluntarily in the autumn.
The nuclear security officials who were laid off on Thursday helped oversee the nation’s stockpile of nuclear weapons. That included staff who are stationed at facilities where the weapons are built, according to CNN.
Attempting to reach the workers, the email, which was sent to current employees, said: “Please work with your supervisors to send this information (once you get it) to people’s personal contact emails.”
Trump is working to slash spending across the board, abroad and at home, and going so far as to call for eliminating the education department. He is getting help from the world’s richest man, Elon Musk, who, through an effort called Doge for Department of Government Efficiency, has sent workers to comb through data at federal agencies and helped implement the “buyout” offer.
Last week, the Trump administration ordered agencies to fire nearly all probationary employees, those who had generally been in their positions for less than a year and not yet earned job protection. That included the NNSA staff members.
Altogether, the move could potentially affect hundreds of thousands of people.
Several of the Trump administration’s efforts to shrink the government’s size and spending have been met with legal challenges.
More than 60 lawsuits have been filed against the Trump administration since the president was inaugurated on 20 January.
[BBC]
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