Tennessee death row inmates face difficult choice

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) – Attorneys for Tennessee’s death row inmates say their clients face a unique and unenviable choice: choosing between two questionable and painful methods of execution.

The national Death Penalty Information Center notes that Tennessee is one of only six states that allow inmates to choose between lethal injection and the electric chair.

Four of the six inmates executed in Tennessee since 2018 have chosen electrocution.

A fifth inmate who has chosen this method is Nicholas Sutton, who is scheduled to die on February 20 for the 1985 murder of a fellow inmate.

Tennessee is the only state to use the electric chair since 2013.