Tell-It Report: Alabama Subjected Inmate to Longest Nitrogen Gas Execution in U.S. History
Anthony Todd Boyd maintained his innocence after being convicted of a 1993 murder.
In Gullah Geechee communities, a “tell-it” was a designated lookout, community warning system and the most trusted source for news and information. The Tell-It Report is ContrabandCamp’s weekly roundup of the Black stories that deserve more attention — from politics to entertainment.
Anthony Todd Boyd was executed via nitrogen gas despite three Supreme Court justices calling the method “intense psychological torment.”
Black student enrollment is down at schools across the South, partly due to cuts in the Federal Pell Grant.
CBS News has reportedly cut its race and culture teams amid Paramount Skydance’s massive layoffs.
Read the full stories below:
Alabama subjected Anthony Boyd to the longest nitrogen gas execution in U.S. history
Alabama executed Anthony Todd Boyd, an inmate who has maintained his innocence since being convicted of a 1993 murder. The state used the highly controversial nitrogen gas for his execution, hours after the Supreme Court’s liberal judges condemned the method for causing “intense psychological torment,” USA Today reports.
Boyd was executed on Oct. 23 at age 54. In 1993, he was accused of killing Gregory Huguley, a man who had been taped up and burned alive over $200 worth of cocaine. According to the Associated Press, a witness on the prosecutor’s side who took a plea deal testified that Boyd did not set Huguley on fire, but he did tape his feet together. Boyd’s defense lawyers said he was at a party the night Huguley was killed. Boyd was convicted of capital murder during a kidnapping and given the death sentence by a vote of 10-2.
For his last words, he maintained his innocence.
“I didn’t kill anybody. I didn’t participate in killing anybody,” he said, according to investigative journalist Lee Hedgepeth. “There is no justice in this state. It’s all political. It’s revenge-motivated. It’s not about closure, because closure comes from within, not with an execution. There will be no justice in this state until we change this system. I want all my people to keep fighting. Let’s get it.”
Boyd’s execution began at 5:57 p.m. Reporters present witnessed him struggling to breathe for 14 minutes. He was pronounced dead at 6:33 pm. His death is on record as the longest nitrogen execution in U.S. history.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor authored a dissenting opinion that underscored the concerns over using nitrogen gas as an execution method. Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson joined her in the opinion.
“Allowing the nitrogen hypoxia experiment to continue despite mounting and unbroken evidence that it violates the Constitution by inflicting unnecessary suffering fails to ‘protec[t] [the] dignity’ of ‘the Nation we have been, the Nation we are, and the Nation we aspire to be,’” Sotomayor wrote. “Seven people have already been subjected to this cruel form of execution. The Court should not allow Boyd to become the eighth.”
Sotomayor also noted that Boyd asked for mercy by requesting to die by firing squad, “which would kill him in seconds, rather than by torturous suffocation lasting up to four minutes.” She stated that he should’ve been constitutionally allowed that method.
“The Court thus turns its back on Boyd and on the Eighth Amendment’s guarantee against cruel and unusual punishment,” she wrote.
Black student enrollment in the South drops due to Pell Grant cuts
A new report shows that enrollment in Southern states has dropped drastically, as 500,000 fewer Black students are able to afford college without Federal Pell Grants.
The Southern Education Foundation and the University of Alabama’s Education Policy Center recently published research that showed 17 Southern states enrolled 23% fewer Pell Grant recipients in the 2021-22 school year than a decade prior. The research, which uses data from the Department of Education’s Integrated Postsecondary Data System and 47 Pell Grant End-of-Year Reports, also found that Black student enrollment across public higher education is down, with the sharpest decline in the South, home to a majority of the nation’s HBCUs.The South enrolls 54% of all Black students.
The report also points to funding cuts to state colleges and to a rise in tuition as additional causes.
“We do not conclude that the enrollment decline of nearly a half million for Black students was solely caused by the declining number of Pell awardees after the 2012 eligibility restrictions were imposed by Congress,” the report read. “However, the total amount of aid Congress allocates each year impacts how many students can access and benefit from a college education.”
The need-based grant saw a 28% decline between 2011 and 2022, dropping from $36 billion to $26 billion. In 2025, the future of Pell Grants has been uncertain as President Donald Trump has continued to reduce aid for those who need it most. CNBC reports that his 2026 fiscal year plan involves cutting the grant to $5,710 per year from $7,395.
“Historically, the Pell Grant was viewed as the foundation for financial support for low-income students,” Lesley Turner, a research fellow of the National Bureau of Economic Research, told the outlet. “It’s the first dollar, regardless of other types of aid you have access to.”
This report is the first in a series of four briefs that the Southern Education Foundation and the University of Alabama’s Education Policy Center will publish about higher education opportunities in the South. Future briefs will explore state funding for public higher education, shortages of STEM graduates of color, recruitment and retention of faculty of color and historical enrollment trends.
“As president at Albany State University, I saw Pell cuts translate directly into enrollment losses,” Art Dunning, former president of the Georgia institution, stated in the brief. “This is critical research that demands attention.”
CBS News has reportedly disbanded its race and culture teams
CBS News’ race and culture verticals have taken a hit with Paramount’s most recent rounds of massive layoffs, according to.
As the parent company and Skydance merged on Wednesday, they laid off more than 2,000 employees. According to The Wrap, that included CBS News’ diversity unit, which was formed after George Floyd’s death. Alvin Patrick, the unit’s head, is still on staff, the outlet reported.
Former CBS News producer Trey Sherman shared a post on TikTok stating that the company laid off all of the people of color on his production team. He also noted that the white staff were reassigned rather than laid off.
Though the network didn’t address the specific cuts, Paramount Skydance chief executive David Ellison said in a memo to staffers on Wednesday, “In some areas, we are addressing redundancies that have emerged across the organization. In others, we are phasing out roles that are no longer aligned with our evolving priorities and the new structure designed to strengthen our focus on growth. Ultimately, these steps are necessary to position Paramount for long-term success.”
This comes just weeks after NBC News let go of its teams running its diversity verticals, including NBC BLK, NBC Latino, NBC Asian America and NBC OUT.
The layoffs are part of $2 billion budget cuts promised with the merger, according to The Guardian. CBS News has also shuttered its Johannesburg bureau and made cuts to its Los Angeles bureau, Evening News Plus and CBS Mornings Plus. Its news data team and radio and TV production units were also impacted, Nieman Labs reports.
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