South Carolina is set to carry out its first executions in a decade due to a new law that compels condemned inmates to choose between the electric chair and a firing squad if lethal injection drugs
Federal judge asked to halt 2 South Carolina electrocutions
MICHELLE LIU, Associated Press/Report for America
June 9, 2021
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This undated file photo provided on July 11, 2019, by the South Carolina Department of Corrections shows the new death row at Broad River Correctional Institution in Columbia, S.C. Lawyers for some of South Carolina’s death row inmates say they might challenge a new law that would let the condemned choose between dying by electric chair or firing squad if lethal injection drugs aren’t available. (South Carolina Department of Corrections via AP, File)AP
FLORENCE, S.C. (AP) Attorneys for two prisoners facing death by electrocution under South Carolina’s new capital punishment law are asking a federal judge to block their executions scheduled later this month, describing the electric chair as a particularly cruel and mutilating method of killing.
Republican South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster on Friday signed into law a bill allowing death row inmates to elect execution by electric chair or firing squad if lethal injection drugs are not available, according to the state legislature's website.