unconstitutional by a court. Tennessee was among the states that provided inmates with a choice of the electric chair or lethal injection; in May 2014, however, the state passed a law allowing the use of the electric chair if lethal injection drugs were unavailable or made unconstitutional. On February 15, 2008, the Nebraska Supreme Court declared execution by electrocution to be "cruel and unusual punishment" prohibited by the Nebraska Constitution. The last judicial electrocution in the U.S. prior to Furman v. Georgia took place in Oklahoma in 1966. The electric chair was used quite frequently in post-Gregg v Georgia executions during the 1980s, but its use in the United States gradually declined in the 1990s due to the widespread adoption of lethal injection. A number of states still allow the condemned person to choose between electrocution and lethal injection, with the most recent U.S. electrocution, of Nicholas Todd Sutton, taking place in February 2020 in Tennessee. See also Nicknames of various electric chairs Gruesome Gertie Old Smokey Old Sparky Yellow Mama State electricians New York State Electrician John Hulbert Robert G. Elliott Joseph Francel Dow Hover References External links "Kemmler's Death by Torture", New York Herald, August 7, 1890. Death Penalty Worldwide Academic research database on the laws, practice, and statistics of capital punishment for every death penalty country in the world. Electric chairs American inventions Chairs Execution equipment Execution methods