Warning: This story contains details of rape and an execution, some of which readers may find distressing.
Witnesses have opened up about the shocking final moments of a death row inmate who was executed by a method banned from being used on cats and dogs.
Inmate Jessie Hoffman Jr was sentenced to death for the murder of Mary 'Molly' Elliot in 1996.
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Hoffman abducted the 28-year-old from a New Orleans parking garage and forced her to withdraw money from an ATM before driving to a remote area in St. Tammany Parish, where he raped and shot her.
The criminal was convicted of first-degree murder in 1998.
His execution on 18 March, 2025 was Louisiana's first use of nitrogen hypoxia, a method which has been adopted due to recent difficulties of obtaining lethal injection drugs.
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This was the fifth time nitrogen gas has been pumped through a gas mask to suffocate a death row inmate, with the first four taking place in Alabama.
Hoffman's execution lasted 19 minutes, and witnesses say Hoffman was strapped down to the table and his body was covered with a thick blanket.
When the gas was switched on, he began twitching and his head jerked up and down.
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He was said to have made a number of involuntary movements during the procedure, which has raised concerns about the method's humaneness.
Hoffman was pronounced dead at 6:50pm when prison warden Darrel Vannoy reopened the curtains.
This comes after the state of Louisiana banned nitrogen gas for euthanising cats and dogs.
His legal representative said it was a cruel and unusual punishment.
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"Jessie no longer bore any resemblance to the 18-year-old who killed Molly Elliott," said one of his attorneys, Cecelia Kappel.
"The State was able to execute him by pushing out a new protocol and setting execution dates to prevent careful judicial review and shrouding the process in secrecy."
Andy Elliott, the husband of Mary Elliot, said: "There is relief that this long nightmare is finally over but also renewed grief for Molly and sadness for Mr. Hoffman’s family, whose nightmare began when mine did and who’ve also had to go through nearly 30 years of this gut-wrenching process through no fault of their own."
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Kappel said Hoffman started practicing Buddhism in 2002 and used meditative breathing practices to calm his anxiety in prison.
"The record evidence unrebutted by the State establishes that, in Buddhist tradition, meditative breathing at the time of death carries profound spiritual significance, founded in the core belief that meditation and unfettered breath at the time of transition from life to death determines the quality of rebirth," she added.
Anish Vij