In this 1994 file photo, Tennessee’s electric chair and its control panel are shown in Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville.MONTGOMERY, Ala. – A state legislator wants Alabama to resume executions using the electric chair since drug shortages have brought lethal injections to halt.
State Rep. Lynn Greer, R-Rogersville, told The Decatur Daily in a story published Friday he favors electrocutions because of continuing delays obtaining drugs used to perform lethal injections.
With the state out of needed drugs, Greer said he would talk Monday with prison officials and the Alabama District Attorneys Association about the possibility of bringing back the electric chair as the state’s main execution method.
Alabama switched from electrocution to lethal injection as its primary execution method 12 years ago. Condemned inmates can still ask to die in the chair, but none has.
“You’d have to be dumb to choose the electric chair,” said Greer.