The gurney and electric chair sit inside the execution chamber connected to the witness gallery Thursday, March 2, 2017, at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville, Tenn. (Photo: Lacy Atkins, Lacy Atkins/The Tennessean)A push from Tennessee officials to schedule executions amid uncertainty concerning the availability of drugs used for lethal injections raises the prospect of the state using the electric chair in 2018 to put someone to death.
It's an outside chance, as legal challenges likely would delay any proposed use of the electric chair. But Tennessee is in a unique position, with the possibility for the country's first execution by electric chair since 2013 arising after a recent series of decisions and comments from the state's highest court and law enforcement officer.
Earlier this year, Tennessee Attorney General Herbert Slatery asked the Tennessee Supreme Court to schedule eight executions before June 1. He said the executions must be scheduled by that day because thereafter, the availability of the drugs used for lethal injections would become "uncertain."
Read more at our news partner's website, tennessean.com.