USA will be executed by flap of shooting for the first time in 15 years

A man convicted of a double homicide is scheduled to be executed in South Carolina on Friday night by a flap of shooting-a method that has not been used in the United States for almost 15 years, and never in the state.

Brad Sigmon, 67, chose the shredding platoon instead of the other two state -approved execution methods, lethal injection or electric chair.

Sigmon was convicted of deaths from the beating of his ex-girlfriend’s parents in 2001.

After the murders, he kidnapped his ex-girlfriend under the aim of a gun, but she managed to escape.

The detainee’s lawyers said he faced a “impossible” choice among the “barbaric” methods used by the state for execution.

“Unless he was elected lethal injection or flap, he would die in the old electric chair of South Carolina, which would burn him and alive kitchen. But the alternative is equally monstrous, ”said Gerald“ Bo ”King, one of Sigmon’s lawyers, in a press release after his client told the state the chosen method.

“If he chose the lethal injection, he would risk the prolonged death suffered by all three men that South Carolina has executed since September,” King added.

“The only choice that remains is the flap of shooting. Brad has no illusions about what to be shot will do with your body. He does not want to inflict this pain to his family, witnesses or the execution team. But given the unnecessary and inconceivable confidentiality of South Carolina, Brad is choosing the best he can, ”said King.

If executed, Sigmon will be the oldest person executed by the state, according to King.

The convict’s lawyers filed an executive clemency petition with Republican governor Henry McMaster, asking to commute his death sentence for perpetual imprisonment without parole, saying in a press release: “Sigmon committed his crimes and was judged while under control of uniagnosed hereditary illness.”

The governor received the petition and is reviewing it, but refused to comment in addition, informed Brandon Charochak, his spokesman, to CNN .

In a Wednesday (5) lawsuit in the US Supreme Court, Sigmon’s lawyers asked the judges to suspend enforcement, asking the Superior Court to “consider whether the reduced election schedule of South Carolina and the arbitrary denial of drug-related information for the South Carolina Department of Corrections.

The detainee lawyers say they tried to get more information about the drugs used during lethal injection, but they were blocked “all the time.”

According to the State Department of Corrections, lawyers received a copy of lethal injection protocols under confidentiality.

When asked, King countered that, although they received some information from the department, they requested basic facts about the date of validity of medicines, test results and storage conditions.

“None of this information, none of these basic facts is in the protocols,” he said.

Scotus has not yet decided on the petition.

Execution by flap of shooting recently became an option in the state for prisoners to choose instead of the electric chair.

Witnesses, such as reporters and lawyers, sit behind bulletproof glass and see the prisoner’s right profile, according to the South Carolina Corrections Department. Rifles and the shot platoon are not visible to witnesses.

How executions work by shot platoon

Brad Sigmon’s execution is scheduled to take place at Broad River Correctional Institution in Columbia, South Carolina, where all executions in the state are performed.

Sigmon received his special meal requested on Wednesday (5) at night, King commented.

He received an individual meal from the Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) that included mashed potatoes and green beans.

In 2022, the South Carolina Corrections Department detailed the room configuration and the protocols of how a throttle execution would be performed.

The rifles used by the three -member shooting platoon will not be visible to witnesses, the department reported at the time. All three rifles will be loaded with real ammunition.

“It is believed that the flap of shooting almost instantaneous unconsciousness and death by exsinguishing bleeding occurs shortly thereafter,” said Dr. Jonathan Groner, emeritus professor of clinical surgery at the Faculty of Medicine at OHIO State University, to CNN On Sunday.

“The three or four performers firing large -heart -caliber bullets would instantly interrupt blood flow to the brain, which, like a cardiac arrest, causes rapid loss of brain function,” he added.

According to state protocols, Sigmon will wear the uniform provided by the prison and will be tied to a chair inside the death chamber.

“A hood will be placed on your head. A small aiming point will be placed on your heart by a member of the execution team, ”according to the protocol summary provided by the DOC.

The three executors are employees of the correction department and offered to be part of the team, said Chrysti Shain, department spokesman, CNN .

The shooting platoon will throw approximately 4.5 meters away.

Witnesses will see the profile on the right side of the convicted prisoner, according to the DOC.

Each executors will once again shoot with rifles using Winchester Tap Urban .308a bullets.

The bullet provides rapid expansion and fragmentation, Shain added.

After the shots, the prisoner will be examined by a doctor.

Once declared dead, a curtain will be closed and the escorted witnesses out, according to the protocol.

History of Execution by Platoon of Fuzing

More than 1,600 executions have occurred in the United States since the 1970s, and the vast majority were made by lethal injection, according to the Death Penalty Information Center (DPI), a non -profit resource for execution data data.

More than 160 prisoners died by electrocussion and 15 by gas, according to group data.

Only three other prisoners have been executed by a shot platoon since 1977, all of them in Utah.

The last throttle execution was Ronnie Gardner, who chose the method in June 2010.

Utah uses a five -member shooting platoon, according to the State Department of Corrections.

Armed with .30 caliber rifles loaded with two shots, the five gunmen, who are not Doc employees, are approximately 6 to 7 meters away from the prisoner. One of the rifles is loaded with party bullets, the department added.

Five States – Idaho, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Utah allow execution by shot platoon, according to DPI.

In Mississippi and Oklahoma, the option for a shot platoon is available “if nitrogen hypoxia, lethal injection and electrocussion are considered unconstitutional or” otherwise unavailable “, they say.

Idaho can become the only state that allows the shooting platoon as its main form of execution, after a bill approved by the state legislature this week.

The bill goes to the table of republican governor Brad Little for his signature. Currently, the state allows the throttle execution as a backup method if drugs for lethal injection are not available.

In 2021, South Carolina approved a law allowing the execution by the state of shifting in the state, but appointed the electric chair as the main means of execution of the state. The law allows prisoners to choose flap or lethal injection if available. The change was made when states across the country found barriers to find the drugs needed for lethal injection, which caused many to stop executions at the time.

In South Carolina, the prisoner should opt for his written execution method, two weeks before his scheduled death, according to DPI. In Utah, if a person was sentenced to death before May 3, 2004, he could choose the shooting platoon as an execution option. The method can also be authorized in the state “if lethal injecting drugs are not available,” the group says.

“States are looking for a way to perform executions that seem to be as peaceful as possible, but they are not,” Robert Dunham told Death Penalty Policy Project to CNN . “And when they can’t do that if they are desperate to perform, they will make a hole in a prisoner with rifles to perform them. This takes the death penalty optically to a new level, because capital penalty has always been brutal. But when we resort to visibly brutal methods, it can have a greater impact and accelerate public opinion away from the death penalty. ”

South Carolina has 28 other prisoners in the death corridor, according to state records.

This content was originally published in the USA will be executed by the first time at 15 years on the CNN Brazil website.

Source: CNN Brasil