Alabama Execution Witnesses Report Confirms Authorities Tortured Black Man Before Murdering Him: Nitrogen Gas Caused Anthony Boyd to Violently Thrash, Suffocate - Took More Than 225 “Agonized Breaths”

From [HERE] On October 23, 2025, Alabama exe­cut­ed Anthony Boyd, despite his unwa­ver­ing claim of inno­cence and a fiery dis­sent authored by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, renew­ing the seri­ous con­cerns that have been con­sis­tent­ly raised about the state’s use of nitro­gen gas. Justice Sotomayor, joined by Justices Kagan and Jackson, dis­sent­ed from the Court’s October 23, 2025, denial of a stay of exe­cu­tion, writ­ing that Alabama’s use of nitro­gen gas ​“vio­lates the Constitution by inflict­ing unnec­es­sary suf­fer­ing[.]” Justice Sotomayor not­ed sev­en peo­ple have been exe­cut­ed by nitro­gen gas since the January 2024 exe­cu­tion of Kenneth Smith, and argued that the Court should have pre­vent­ed Mr. Boyd from becom­ing the eighth.

“Boyd asks for the barest form of mer­cy: to die by fir­ing squad, which would kill him in sec­onds, rather than by tor­tur­ous suf­fo­ca­tion last­ing up to four min­utes. The Constitution would grant him that grace. My col­leagues do not. The Court thus turns its back on Boyd and on the Eighth Amendment’s guar­an­tee against cru­el and unusual punishment.”

JUSTICE SONIA SOTOMAYOR, DIS­SENT­ING FROM THE COURT’S DENIAL OF ANTHONY BOYD’S REQUEST FOR A STAY OF EXECUTION.

In the Court’s dis­sent, Justice Sotomayor not­ed that Mr. Boyd would remain con­scious for ​“up to sev­en full min­utes of [] excru­ci­at­ing suf­fo­ca­tion,” dur­ing which he would expe­ri­ence ​“intense psy­cho­log­i­cal tor­ment” while suf­fo­cat­ing against the pri­mal instinct to breathe. In fact, Mr. Boyd was con­scious for more than twice that amount of time. Justice Sotomayor wrote that use of this method would amount to ​“super­added psy­cho­log­i­cal tor­ment” that ​“goes well beyond what is inher­ent in any con­sti­tu­tion­al method of exe­cu­tion.” Justice Sotomayor said the prob­lems present in each of the state’s pre­vi­ous nitro­gen gas exe­cu­tions — where each indi­vid­ual exhib­it­ed con­tin­ued con­scious­ness and intense shak­ing and thrash­ing — raised enough con­cern to ques­tion the con­sti­tu­tion­al­i­ty of nitro­gen gas executions.

According to media wit­ness­es, Mr. Boyd’s exe­cu­tion was the longest nitro­gen gas exe­cu­tion thus far, tak­ing near­ly 40 min­utes for Mr. Boyd’s time of death to be announced. Journalist Lee Hedgepeth, who has wit­nessed sev­er­al nitro­gen gas exe­cu­tions, took a detailed account of Mr. Boyd’s exe­cu­tion. At 5:50pm, cor­rec­tion­al offi­cers opened the cur­tains to the exe­cu­tion cham­ber, and Mr. Boyd spoke his last words.

“I didn’t kill any­body. I didn’t par­tic­i­pate in killing any­body,” he said. ​“There is no jus­tice in this state. It’s all polit­i­cal. It’s revenge moti­vat­ed. It’s not about clo­sure, because clo­sure comes from with­in, not with an exe­cu­tion. There will be no jus­tice in this state until we change this sys­tem. I want all my peo­ple to keep fight­ing. Let’s get it.”

LAST WORDS OF ANTHONY BOYD, EXE­CUT­ED BY ALABAMA USING NITRO­GEN GAS ON OCTOBER 24, 2025.

At 5:55, a prison offi­cial checked the gas mask attached to Mr. Boyd’s face and his spir­i­tu­al advi­sor began to read aloud from his Bible. Two min­utes lat­er, at 5:57, media wit­ness­es report­ed that Mr. Boyd began to ​“vio­lent­ly react, thrash­ing against his restraints.” According to Mr. Hedgepeth, Mr. Boyd’s eyes rolled back, and he con­tin­ued to con­vulse, lift­ing his legs from the gur­ney. By 6:00, Mr. Boyd’s move­ment stead­ied, but he ​“began a series of deep, ago­nized breaths that last­ed for more than 15 min­utes, each break shud­der­ing Boyd’s restrained head and neck.” According to Mr. Hedgepeth’s account, Mr. Boyd gasped more than 225 times. At 6:16 Mr. Boyd was still draw­ing deep breaths. Within a few min­utes, accord­ing to the Montgomery Advertiser there was no move­ment. Prison offi­cials announced Mr. Boyd’s time of death at 6:33pm. [MORE]