South Carolina man to be killed in US’s first firing squad execution in 15 years

A South Carolina man on death row has chosen to be killed by firing squad, and if his execution goes forward next month, it would be the first time in 15 years that capital punishment in the US is carried out by gunfire.

Brad Sigmon, 67, is scheduled to be shot to death on 7 March, part of a spate of rapid killings the state has pursued in the last six months as it revives executions after a 13-year pause. South Carolina now directs those on death row to choose how they will be killed – electric chair, lethal injection or shooting. If they decline to make a selection, the state electrocutes them.

Attorneys for men on South Carolina’s death row have previously objected to firing squads, raising concerns about the pain caused by shootings and arguing the method constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. But Sigmon selected a firing squad in part because of concerns about the state’s lethal injection methods, his attorneys said.

The last three executions in the state were carried out with injections of pentobarbital, a sedative. Each time, it took more than 20 minutes for the men to die, and in one case, it appeared to cause a man to suffer a condition akin to drowning and suffocation, lawyers for the men said in court filings. Sigmon’s lawyers have also raised concerns about the secrecy surrounding the state’s lethal injection drugs and protocols.

“He has a right to this choice, but it’s not an informed choice,” Gerald “Bo” King, one of Sigmon’s lawyers, said in an interview. “My frustration is we are in a world where he has to choose between being electrocuted, poisoned or shot, and we can’t even get the most basic facts you would want to make that decision.”

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South Carolina had ceased executions since 2011 in part because it ran out of lethal injection supplies as pharmaceutical companies faced pressure to stop selling drugs to facilitate state killings. But lawmakers in 2023 passed a shield law to keep the identity of suppliers secret, allowing officials to restock lethal drugs and resume executions last year.

Sigmon’s attorneys noted in a recent filing that the South Carolina department of corrections (SCDC) was obliged to “disclose some basic facts about the drug’s creation, quality and reliability” and criticized prison officials for failing to provide information about the “potency, purity and stability” of the drugs, their expiration dates, and how they are being tested and stored.

In the execution of Richard Moore in November, autopsy records suggested officials injected him with a second dose of pentobarbital after 10 minutes had passed, even though the SCDC has said the injections are to happen “via a single dose”, lawyers said. His autopsy also showed his lungs were swollen with fluid, “an excruciating condition known as pulmonary edema”.

After the January execution of Marion Bowman, which took roughly 23 minutes, an SCDC official declined to say how many doses were injected, saying: “We followed our protocol and that is not disclosed.”

“You have three executions that have seemingly gone awry,” said King, pointing to previous cases in other states of botched executions by lethal injection and mishandling of the drugs. “It could be excruciatingly painful.”

South Carolina officials have previously said that the firing squad protocols involve strapping the person to a chair with an “aim point” placed on his heart and a hood covering his head. Three men armed with rifles will then shoot from behind a wall 15ft away with an opening in it.

In 2022, a South Carolina judge said this method “constitutes torture” and was “cruel” and unconstitutional. The judge noted the person was “likely to be conscious for a minimum of 10 seconds after impact” and the pain could be extended “if the ammunition does not fully incapacitate the heart”: “During this time, he will feel excruciating pain resulting from the gunshot wounds and broken bones.” If the person’s vital signs were still present 10 minutes after the first shots, staff would fire a second time, the judge noted.

Last year, the state supreme court ruled all methods were lawful since officials were giving the men a choice of method.

Sigmon’s potential killing by firing squad comes at a time of increasing scrutiny of methods of execution across the country, and as Donald Trump has pledged to revive capital punishment at the federal level and help ensure that states have “sufficient supplies” to carry out killings. Alabama has recently been using nitrogen hypoxia, a suffocation method human rights groups say amounts to torture.

Five states currently allow firing squads, and Idaho lawmakers are now pushing to make it the primary execution method. The last firing squad execution in the US was in 2010 in Utah, the only state to use this method in the last 50 years.

“I expect many members of the public will be shocked by the graphic and bloody display that will result from a firing squad execution,” said Robin Maher, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center. “Unlike other forms of execution, this will look exactly like what it is: the deliberate and intentional taking of life by the state, using a vivid and brutal method.”

The recent South Carolina executions have been observed by several journalists, and the state’s protocols say the firing squad chair would not directly face witnesses, but observers would see the “right-side profile” of the person being killed.

Chrysti Shain, an SCDC spokesperson, said in an email that its lethal injection policies mirrored federal guidelines and that the last three executions “followed protocol”. The US justice department, however, withdrew its pentobarbital protocol in January, just before Trump’s inauguration, citing “uncertainty” over whether the drug “causes unnecessary pain and suffering”.

Shain also pointed to the court declaration of an anesthesiologist hired by the state, who said pentobarbital on average would cause unconsciousness within 20 to 30 seconds, and that the individual would not feel pain or suffocation.

Sigmon was convicted of the 2001 murders of his ex-girlfriend’s parents. Sigmon admitted his guilt in court, and his lawyers have argued that the killings stemmed from a childhood of physical abuse and neglect and severe, inherited mental illness that went undiagnosed and untreated. In a petition filed on Thursday seeking to stop the execution, his lawyers argued that Sigmon’s trial counsel failed to present evidence of his trauma and mental illness.

“This was a horrible crime that was a product of this convergence of mental illness and organic brain injuries that amplified his manic and irrational episodes,” said King, who is the chief of the capital habeas unit for the fourth circuit, which is part of the federal public defender’s office. “Brad is enormously remorseful. He’s a devout Christian and spends a tremendous amount of time on prayer and penitence. He repents every day for what he’s done.”

Over the years, Sigmon has become a “source of strength and stability to everyone in the prison – the fellow prisoners, and the guards”, King added.

Sigmon would be the oldest person ever executed by South Carolina. In an earlier statement when Sigmon’s execution date was announced, King said: “Executing Brad would serve no purpose except to send a single, chilling message: no matter how profoundly a person repents, South Carolina refuses to recognize redemption.”