The Supreme Court, voting 5-4 Tuesday, rejected a challenge...

The Supreme Court, voting 5-4 Tuesday, rejected a challenge to Alabama's use of the electric chair as the only means of execution. But doubt remained whether three states - Alabama, Georgia and Nebraska - can continue offering no alternative for putting inmates to death. The justices turned away an appeal that called death in Alabama's electric chair a type of "cruel and unusual punishment" the Constitution forbids. Death row inmate Robert Lee Tarver contended that Alabama's "antiquated" electric chair exposes him to a risk of "excessive burning, disfigurement and ... pain and suffering."Alabama Attorney General Bill Pryor said he still will urge the state Legislature to pass a law allowing lethal injection to be used if the Supreme Court ever does rule that electrocution is unconstitutional. Such a bill is pending in the Alabama House. A bill to make injection the primary means of execution is pending in the Alabama Senate.