I am a writer where in my spy-novel, a character faces execution in the US, most likely by Lethal Injection, however, there are people in the government that want to speed the date of execution up than wait years that would typically follow for civilian death-row inmates. They would want to do this as 'legal' as possible due to the public nature of the case.
I've been looking around on the internet for relevant and credible information that could help determine minimum time but it's not clear due to state differences of capital punishments and methods. it can be quite contradictive as well since I've read that sometimes, it gets short when the defendant drops the appeals and the execution is carried out within a few months but I remain uncertain on if this is true, as another source said 5 years.
Which brings me to the question here, (not tied to any particular state as I can adjust the story to the answer), what is the shortest amount someone could hypothetically wait on death row before their execution?
This can include the by-request of the defendant, the dropping of an appeal and input of higher authorities.
