He was opposed by Thomas Edison. But after Florida made the gruesome photos Davis public on the Internet, it prompted a new surge in opposition, leading several states to drop the chair as a method of execution, or give inmates a choice of lethal injection, including in Florida.
Inmates overwhelmingly opt for lethal injection.
And now, according to most experts, the electric chair is on its last legs. Michael Rondelet, a social sciences professor at the University of Florida says the electric chair is a cruel way to kill a man, and that it would disappear just as the noose, the method of execution that the chair replaced, has largely disappeared as a way of punishment. And twenty years from now, he said, our children may be debating the cruelty of lethal injection, if they don't abolish the death penalty altogether. But then, right before the executioner threw the switch, Davis let out two unintelligible screams. The current slammed into his body, forcing him to jerk back against the chair and at the straps binding him to the chair.