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How to Kill Someone? Murder is the unlawful killing of another human without justification or a valid excuse, especially murder committed with malice aforethought. Depending on the jurisdiction, homicide may be distinguished from other forms of illegal homicide, such as manslaughter.
Manslaughter is a killing committed without malice, with reasonable provocation, or due to diminished mental capacity. Where it is recognized, voluntary manslaughter involves a killing that lacks all but the most attenuated of guilty intentions, recklessness.
How to Kill Someone?
Hanging
Depending on how the hanging is done, it may or may not work. Generally, there are three methods:
- Suspension hanging. A noose is hauled upward, or a stool is pulled from under your feet, to hang your body. You die when the noose chokes off your trachea and squeezes blood out of your head. The combination of these two factors is fatal on its own. In ancient Persia, this method of hanging was developed and is still used today in Iran and other nations.
- Short-drop hanging. Before the knot tightens, you are dropped from a ladder or the like and fall approximately the length of your legs. The result is faster choking, as well as torn neck muscles, but the neck is not usually broken. To break the victim’s neck, the hangman sometimes jumped on his shoulders or pulled his legs.
- Long-drop hanging. A trapdoor would bind and blindfold you. Weight and bodybuild were used to determine the length of the rope. Almost instantly, your neck would break, ending your life.
Electrocution
There is a very small answer. Even 0.007 amps (7mA) across the heart for three seconds is enough to kill. It is almost certain that 0.1 amps (100mA) passing through the body will be fatal.
An electric shock’s current is determined by the voltage and resistance of the circuit. Electric current is highly resistant to the human body. Without sufficient voltage, a dangerous amount of current cannot flow through the body and cause injury or death. A potentially lethal current can be driven through the body at more than fifty volts.
An electric shock’s severity can also be determined by its duration and where it enters the body. Compared to a shock between two toes, a shock passing from one arm to the other arm through the chest is much more dangerous.
Here are some examples:
- Static shocks can reach 20,000 volts or more, but at extremely low currents and for very short periods of time: Harmless
- It is impossible to drive a dangerous level of current through a 9V battery: Harmless
- The voltage of 240VAC is hazardous, and it can drive a very dangerous current: Potentially lethal
- Lightning bolts can deliver extremely high currents (around 30,000 amps): potentially lethal.
The Firing Squad
A death row inmate named Thomas Arthur brought a very unusual claim to the Supreme Court in 2017. The state of Alabama planned to execute Arthur with a three-drug protocol that included a notoriously unreliable anesthetic. Instead of being executed by firing squad, he asked the Court to allow him to die by firing squad. His belief was that such a death would be less painful than the fate Alabama had in mind for him.
Even though the Court rejected this request in Arthur v. Dunn (2017), Sotomayor once again dissented. Sotomayor wrote that condemned prisoners, like Arthur, might find greater dignity in an instantaneous death rather than prolonged torture on a medical gurney if a competently performed shooting causes nearly instant death.
Lethal Injection
Lethal injection is the primary method of execution used by all states and the federal government. Typically, one, two, or three drugs are used by jurisdictions in their protocols.
In most three-drug protocols, an anesthetic or sedative is administered first, followed by a paralyzing drug, and then a drug that stops the heart. In one- or two-drug protocols, overdoses of anesthetics or sedatives usually cause death.
The Supreme Court has affirmed the constitutionality of lethal injection, but the specific applications used in states continue to be challenged.
Due to the difficulty of obtaining the drugs used in earlier executions, states have resorted to experimenting with new drugs and drug combinations. Numerous prolonged and painful executions have resulted from this.
When lethal drugs cannot be obtained, states are also resorting to previously discarded methods of execution, such as the electric chair and gas chamber.