Convicted murderer James Barber was executed early Friday morning by the state of Alabama, the state's first lethal injection since its pause on capital punishment was lifted in February after a review of failed attempts.
Gov. Kay Ivey (R-AL) paused executions in her state last November due to difficulties inserting IVs, the Associated Press reported. An internal review of the mishaps was carried out, and three months later, it was lifted, clearing the way for lethal injections to continue. Barber requested for his execution to be blocked due to the past failures, saying he could be subject to "substantial harm."
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But the U.S. Supreme Court denied Barber's application in a 6-3 ruling, with the three liberal justices dissenting, writing that the court shouldn't let Barber be Alabama's "guinea pig." Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall said Barber was executed shortly before 2 a.m. on Friday.
Barber, 64, had been on death row for almost 20 years for the 2001 robbery and killing of Dorothy Epps, a 75-year-old homeowner who Barber knew from his work as a handyman, per NBC News.
"I have a fair amount of trepidation about the process that they obviously haven't perfected — to be at their hands and be the first one after they didn't do a true review of the protocol and made no real changes," Barber told the outlet last Saturday, describing his fears about the method of the execution.
Barber was originally set to be executed Thursday evening, but the state was ultimately forced to wait for a Supreme Court ruling over whether the execution could move forward, per local investigative reporter Lee Hedgepeth. Lawyers for the state argued that the highest court in the country shouldn't even have taken the case at all.
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Barber's execution has renewed debate over the morality of capital punishment, with, as the Supreme Court's ruling illustrates, the matter largely falling on partisan lines. Liberals tend to believe it is unjust and that rehabilitation is possible even for the country's most violent offenders, while conservatives argue, in the rare cases where it is decided, that it is a necessity.
Twenty-seven states still have the death penalty, three of which have a governor-imposed moratorium, while 23 states do not allow capital punishment, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. While nowhere near exact, states that lean right, such as Alabama, tend to allow for capital punishment, while states that lean left tend to have abolished the practice.