The State of Louisiana executed Jessie Hoffman Jr last night in Angola Prison's death chamber. He was killed with nitrogen gas after his lawyers lost a last-minute appeal arguing that the execution method was cruel and unusual.
If anyone deserved the death penalty, it was Mr. Hoffman. He kidnapped, raped, and murdered a young woman in 1996.
Nevertheless, it is unconscionable for Louisiana to confine someone on death row for decades before killing him. As Pope Francis observed, a life sentence is a death sentence.
In essence, then, the state of Louisiana executed Hoffman twice: First, by confining him for more than a quarter of a century as a death row inmate and a second time by injecting him with nitrogen gas.
In my humble opinion, that's a cruel and unusual punishment.
