May 1, 1942: Robert James was the state’s last hanging execution.

By that point the state had already decided to replace the noose with the ostensibly more humane gas chamber, so James’ execution ushered out one era of capital punishment with a harbinger of what has plagued the practice since: It’s surprisingly hard to find a palatable way to kill people.

According to University of Richmond law professor Corinna Lain, the guillotine, the rope, the electric chair and the needle all have been heralded — at one time or another — as a new and improved means of death.

“If you trace the evolution of execution methods over time,” Lain said, “what you see is a series of promises by the state that each and every method is humane.”

But whether any of them actually has been is a subject of ongoing debate. When a federal judge initially stopped California from executing people in 2006, it was over concerns that the state’s lethal injection protocol could be cruel and unusual punishment.

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