Utah Proposes Firing Squad for Executions
Utah Proposes Firing Squad for Executions
Ten years after banning the use of firing squads in state executions, Utah lawmakers on Wednesday endorsed a proposal to allow the practice again to avoid problems with lethal-injection drugs.
The proposal from Republican Rep. Paul Ray of Clearfield would call for a firing squad if the state cannot obtain the lethal injection drugs 30 days before the scheduled execution. Utah dropped firing squads out of concern about the media attention, but Ray said it's the most humane way to execute someone because the inmate dies instantly.
"We have to have an option," Ray told reporters Wednesday. "If we go hanging, if we go to the guillotine, or we go to the firing squad, electric chair, you're still going to have the same circus atmosphere behind it. So is it really going to matter?"
An interim panel of Utah lawmakers approved the idea on a 9-2 vote Wednesday. The proposal still needs to go through the full legislative process once lawmakers convene for their annual session in January. Under current law, death by firing squad is only an option for criminals sentenced to death before 2004. It was last used in 2010.
For years, states used a three-drug combination to execute inmates, but European drugmakers have refused to sell them to prisons and corrections departments out of opposition to the death penalty. That move has led states to use different types, combinations and doses of lethal drugs, but those methods have been challenged in court.
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"We have to have an option," Ray told reporters Wednesday. "If we go hanging, if we go to the guillotine, or we go to the firing squad, electric chair, you're still going to have the same circus atmosphere behind it. So is it really going to matter?"
And since ammunition from multiple manufacturers can be used in many weapons, multiple providers would be used and identified as the source of the bullets
Good point, recidivism rate among those executed is indeed 0%
I have never argued that it was not vengeance, I totally agree but a vengeance of a specific kind
Retribution - punishment inflicted on someone as vengeance for a wrong or criminal act.
Yes, I agree with President Obama who said
I agree that as far as execution styles go, firing squad is definitely the most humane. Also the most cost efficient I would think.
If the death penalty is to mete out justice and not vengeance, isn't it incumbent on our civilized society to kill in the most humane way possible? I don'tbelieve a shot in the heart provides the most expedient means of death, also theamount of suffering (since this is not vengeance) has to be considered.
In the name of justice I propose a study to determine how to best kill our fellow man. ISIS prefers beheading in their justice system, who knows maybe it the quickest (certainly cheap) and produces the least amount of suffering....perhaps a bullet to the head. /s
But who cares? They're horrific criminals that should be put down like dogs because our justice system is ALWAYS right! Are our barbarian acts more palatable because we're America?
Whether I am a person of faith or not is none of your business or concern
Use the guillotine
While I am generally opposed to the Death Penalty, from my understanding of death and suffering, if your going to do it; the use a guillotine is humane albeit macabre and gruesome....and final.
Europe is on the right side of this issue, debate time should be over. But then again, we're still debating abortion and gay marriage
The statistics have always been and continue to be an area our society will not address.