The state has chosen a new death-penalty protocol for Jeffery James Lee, a man convicted in Alabama capital murder case tied to a 1998 pawn shop robbery. On Wednesday, Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey set Lee’s execution for June 11, with officials planning to carry it out using nitrogen gas. Lee’s scheduled execution comes as he continues to challenge the procedure in federal court, seeking to block what he argues would violate constitutional limits on cruel and unusual punishment.
Lee was convicted of two counts of capital murder for the killings of Jimmy Ellis and Elaine Thompson, who prosecutors said were killed during the Dec. 12, 1998 robbery of Ellis’s pawn shop near Orrville, Alabama. According to the prosecution described in the case reporting, Lee entered the shop with a sawed-off shotgun and shot Ellis, the owner, and Thompson, an employee.
A jury voted 7-5 that Lee should receive a sentence of life imprisonment, but a judge overrode the jury’s recommendation and sentenced Lee to death. Alabama ended the practice of judicial override in 2017, and no longer allows a judge to disregard a jury’s sentencing decision in death penalty cases.
Ivey’s decision set an execution date while Lee has an ongoing federal lawsuit challenging the humaneness of nitrogen gas as an execution method. The federal case is set against the backdrop of Alabama’s shift toward nitrogen executions, which began in 2024.
In Lee’s lawsuit, his lawyers have asked the Alabama Supreme Court to pause the authorization of an execution date until the challenge to the nitrogen method is resolved. The execution date nevertheless was set, according to the reporting, and a federal judge scheduled an April 27 bench trial to address the constitutional challenge.
Nitrogen execution works by using a gas mask strapped over the person’s face to replace breathable air with pure nitrogen gas, leading to death by lack of oxygen, according to the description of how the method is carried out. Alabama began using nitrogen gas in 2024, and the method has since been used eight times nationwide: seven executions in Alabama and one in Louisiana.