[Trump Appt] Judge Clears the Way for Inhumane AL Authorities to Murder Another Intellectually Disabled Black Man on Thursday. Violentists Insist on Execution by Injection b/c He Filled Form Out Wrong

From [HERE] and [HERE] An intellectually disabled Black death-row prisoner has appealed a federal district court ruling that clears the way for his execution on October 21, 2021.

On October 17, a federal district court judge denied for a second time Willie B. Smith III’s claim that putting him to death by lethal injection violates his rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Lawyers for Smith (pictured) on October 19, 2021 filed a motion in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit to stay his scheduled execution so he can appeal the district court’s decision. Smith’s motion “seek[s] to prohibit the State of Alabama from executing him in any manner other than with nitrogen hypoxia.”

Judge Emily Marks’ over-the-weekend ruling on October 17, 2021, comes two days after the circuit court reversed her prior holding that Smith lacked standing to file a claim under the ADA. A unanimous panel of the appeals court vacated that ruling on October 15, 2021 and directed Marks to address Smith’s ADA claim on its merits.

Smith, who a federal appeals court agrees qualifies as intellectually disabled under accepted clinical definitions of the disorder, was convicted in 1992 for the murder of a woman he had robbed and abducted at an ATM machine. His jury voted 10-2 to recommend the death penalty and, despite the non-unanimous sentencing recommendation, his trial judge imposed the death penalty. Three states — Alabama, Florida, and Delaware — permitted that practice at the time, and Alabama is the only one that still allows it. 

Smith is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection, Alabama’s default method of execution, because he failed to fill out a form distributed by Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC) officials in which he could have designated an alternative method of execution. Per state legislation enacted in 2018, Smith and others on death row had 30 days from June 1, 2018, to choose whether to be executed by lethal injection or by execution nitrogen hypoxia. To opt for nitrogen hypoxia, prisoners who received the form needed to sign, date, and return a provided form. According to the Montgomery Adviser, several inmates received notice “a few days before the deadline and described a scramble to contact attorneys and understand the offer to them.” 

Smith received this form, but his legal team says he needed—and never received—assistance to understand its contents and what to do with it. Smith’s lawyers say that his “significant cognitive deficiencies” qualify him for the protection under the ADA and require Alabama to provide him reasonable accommodations in designating a method of execution. Had those accommodations been made, his lawyers say he would have designated execution by nitrogen gas. 

Alabama has begun building the physical infrastructure for nitrogen hypoxia executions, but does not yet have a protocol in place to carry them out.