South Carolina Death Row Inmates Choose Firing Squad Execution Over Electric Chair

Prison illustration Photo by Umanoide on Unsplash

JAKARTA - Richard Bernard Moore (57 years) in this world will end on April 29. South Carolina death row inmates have chosen to be executed by firing squad rather than the electric chair at the end of this month.

This refers to court documents that were filed last Friday, April 15, as quoted by the New York Post, Saturday April 16.

Richard Bernard Moore will be the first prisoner in the state to be forced to choose his form of the death penalty. The one-year-old law makes the electric chair the default method. But convicts are also given the option to choose to be shot.

Richard Bernard Moore has been in detention for decades following his conviction in the 1999 murder case. He killed a Spartanburg shop clerk.

At that time Moore was arrested for trying to rob Nikki's Speedy Mart on September 16, 1999. In this case, an officer named James Mahoney was killed. But Moore said he attacked in self-defense.

"I believe this election forced me to choose between two unconstitutional methods of execution, and I do not intend to ignore any challenge to electric shock or firing squad by making a choice," Moore said in a statement.

Moore was supposed to be executed by lethal injection in 2020. But officials were unable to confirm the lethal injection drugs required for the execution.

Moore will now be shot dead by three prison workers with rifles on April 29, officials said. He would become the fourth American to be executed by firing squad since 1976.

Moore's attorneys have asked the state's Supreme Court to delay his death while two other courts review the legality of the death penalty.

Lawyers argued that being forced to choose between the firing squad and the electric chair amounted to a cruel and unusual punishment.