The firing squad option will just result in other delays. They should remove it. The electric chair is enough as a backup method of execution.
The firing squad option will just result in other delays. They should remove it. The electric chair is enough as a backup method of execution.
Most importantly, amending the bill again would require further readings without certainty that the two houses would reach an agreement. While adopting the same bill would allow to send it to the governor without further delay, and he said he supported legislating to resume executions.
As a practical matter, constituting a firing squad is probably not a difficult nor a long task.
Adding firing squad would also be useful because that’s a field where experience is needed and currently lacking in the U.S.
As a legal matter, that's not going to be an insurmountable nor an endless problem. A U.S. Supreme Court precedent says there is no right to sue in federal courts when the offender has chosen a method other that the state's default one. The prosecution should quote Stewart v. LaGrand (1999) as a persuasive precedent in their filings to state courts and they might choose the same solution. Even if they did not:
1) Barring access to federal courts to even some convicts can be an advantage and will never be a disadvantage.
2) It is not sure that all convicts will choose shooting, so others will be eligible for electrocution and at least some executions could happen as long as only one of the two methods is enforceable. It is always more practical to allow multiple methods instead of just one (except untested methods such as nitrogen hypoxia that would be a disastrous failure, that's why Oklahoma abandoned it and Alabama should remove it from its statutes).
Last edited by Steven AB; 04-21-2021 at 05:10 PM.
"If ever there were a case for a referendum, this is one on which the people should be allowed to express their own views and not irresponsible votes in the House of Commons." — Winston Churchill, on the death penalty
The self-styled "Death Penalty Information Center" is financed by the oligarchic European Union. — The Daily Signal
I’d much rather see the electric chair is the default method. They already have it. Why not utilize it? Firing squad was added as option in Mississippi I believe and they haven’t made any attempts to utilize it. I don’t want South Carolina to do the same.
"Default" means when the convict refuses to choose one of the two methods, not when the other is unavailable.
That's what provides Mississippi law and that's why it is somewhat hard to enforce, contrary to this South Carolina bill which would be far more effective to resume executions.
Last edited by Steven AB; 04-21-2021 at 04:58 PM.
"If ever there were a case for a referendum, this is one on which the people should be allowed to express their own views and not irresponsible votes in the House of Commons." — Winston Churchill, on the death penalty
The self-styled "Death Penalty Information Center" is financed by the oligarchic European Union. — The Daily Signal
That’s what I’m saying I’d rather the electric chair be default since they already have it. Since they don’t have firing squad it would be a lot better off to make the chair default. You know once this is signed into law the inmates will just choose the squad to avoid execution since they don’t have at the moment. Now if they added this an option but only if it’s available I wouldn’t care.
Last edited by Neil; 04-21-2021 at 04:45 PM.
The abolitionist propaganda of course always says that any effort to resume executions is pointless.
But firing squad is by definition the very method that any state can implement swiftly and easily even if it has nothing in the first place.
It is also always efficient to provide at the same time that if one method is unavailable for any legal or practical reason, the state can use the other method whatever the convict's choice.
http://www.cncpunishment.com/forums/...l=1#post134124
Last edited by Steven AB; 04-21-2021 at 05:51 PM.
"If ever there were a case for a referendum, this is one on which the people should be allowed to express their own views and not irresponsible votes in the House of Commons." — Winston Churchill, on the death penalty
The self-styled "Death Penalty Information Center" is financed by the oligarchic European Union. — The Daily Signal
If you have a governor who is willing to carry out the punishment, the firing squad is easily the most feasible choice.
Ammo can be sold between two eligible persons without issue. With the electric chair, you'll need a licensed electrician to maintain the equipment. With lethal injection, you need either a drug source or a pharmacist willing to compound drugs. Either of those people or entities could be subject to public pressure. The state absolutely has guns and ammo, which it can pay for in cash and distribute throughout the state without a paper trail.
I’m not so sure South Carolina would have a problem maintaining the electric chair when they set Moore’s execution they said they wouldn’t have any problems proceeding with the execution if he chose the chair. It’s evident they’ve been maintaining it. My main concern with this bill was they won’t ever utilize the firing squad no matter how easy it is to obtain the equipment for it. I’m all for it if they did. McMaster seems very serious on resuming. I hope he can deliver the results.
Last edited by Neil; 04-21-2021 at 06:13 PM.
It is true that they will probably have almost no practical problem with electrocution as well.
But if yourself concede there is no practical impediment for firing squad, there is no reason to believe that they will not use it: that will be up to the very same governor having signed shooting executions into law.
http://www.cncpunishment.com/forums/...l=1#post134124
Last edited by Steven AB; 04-22-2021 at 09:00 AM.
"If ever there were a case for a referendum, this is one on which the people should be allowed to express their own views and not irresponsible votes in the House of Commons." — Winston Churchill, on the death penalty
The self-styled "Death Penalty Information Center" is financed by the oligarchic European Union. — The Daily Signal
SC Senate passes bill to make electric chair default execution method
COLUMBIA, S.C. (WCSC/AP) - The South Carolina Senate has passed a bill that would change the state’s default method of execution and add a third option.
Senators added a firing squad as an alternative to the electric chair if the state is unable to execute condemned inmates through lethal injection.
The Senate then approved the bill Tuesday on a key 32-11 vote with several Democrats joining Republicans in the proposal which would allow South Carolina to restart executions after nearly 10 years. Wednesday’s final vote would send the bill to the South Carolina House.
The state can’t put anyone to death now because its supply of lethal injection drugs expired and it hasn’t been able to buy more. The state’s usual injection protocol calls for three drugs: the sedative pentobarbital, pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride. But the corrections agency has said it hasn’t had the drugs in stock since 2013, when its last supplies expired.
During his State of the State Address in January, Gov. Henry McMaster called on the General Assembly to pass a shield law that would protect the names of companies that manufacture the drugs necessary from lethal injection to be made public. Without such a law, those companies have not been willing to sell their products to the state to use in executions.
“We have no means to carry out a death sentence in South Carolina, and the murderers know it,” he said in his Jan. 13 speech before the state legislature. “Fourteen states have enacted such a shield law. South Carolina Department of Corrections Director Bryan Stirling and I have been asking the General Assembly to fix this for years. Legislation was almost approved on the final day last year. I ask the General Assembly: fix this. Give these grieving families and loved ones the justice and closure they are owed by law.”
The execution of Richard Bernard Moore, convicted in the 1999 killing of a convenience store clerk in Spartanburg County, had been scheduled for November. But the execution was delayed because the state has run out of drugs necessary to carry out an execution and has not been able to find a drug maker willing to sell the state the drugs for that purpose.
The South Carolina Supreme Court affirmed that according to state law, Moore would have to be executed by lethal injection by default because he did not choose between that and electrocution by a deadline.
Moore is one of 37 people, all men, currently on South Carolina’s death row. Five of them involved cases from Lowcountry counties.
Some prosecutors have sought the death penalty less often in recent years, citing the state’s inability to carry out executions.
South Carolina’s last execution was in 2011.
Currently, eight other states can use electric chairs and Utah, Oklahoma and Mississippi allow firing squads.
The House has considered a similar bill without the firing squad option, but can now consider the Senate version.
https://www.wistv.com/2021/04/21/sc-...cution-method/
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