The state of Alabama put to death Kenneth Eugene Smith by the untested nitrogen hypoxia asphyxiation method on Jan. 25. Smith was convicted of the murder-for-hire of Elizabeth Sennett in 1988.
I knew Liz and her husband, Charles. He was the pastor at the Church of Christ in the little town where I grew up. They were friends with my parents and my father was also a pastor in that town. Charles and I served briefly together in the volunteer fire department.
Charles hired three men to murder his wife. I had already left the town and gone to grad school in Virginia by that time. Nevertheless, it was a shock to hear of her murder, then a greater shock to hear that Charles had been behind it. There was an affair with another woman — I knew her, too. She used to shop in the little grocery store where I worked as a teenager. She was not implicated in the murder. News stories indicate there was a financial problem and Charles hoped to collect the life insurance money to pay his debts.