South Carolina Sees Shortage Of Lethal Injection, Authorizes Firing Squad Instead
SHORTAGE OF LETHAL INJECTION – Much like Utah, Oklahoma, and Mississippi, South Carolina approved the use of firing squads due to a limited supply of drugs used in lethal injections.
South Carolina approved the bill with a 32-11 vote. Because of this, the number of executions delayed for the past 10 years would now proceed. Since 2013, South Carolina has lacked the needed drugs, phenobarbital, pancuronium bromide, and potassium chloride to create a dose of the lethal injection.
Currently, there are still some supplies of these drugs. However, most of them had already become expired. Furthermore, authorities have failed to purchase more due to the pandemic.
Since the beginning, inmates on death row were allowed to choose the method of which they’d be killed. But, due to shortage, most choose lethal injection knowing that their execution would be delayed.
But, with the new Senate Bill, inmates have to choose between the electric chair or death via firing squad. As of now, South Carolina is one of 9 nine states across the U.S.A that still use the electric chair.
However, according to an article from Unilad, its still the same chair used since 1912 after it was first introduced as a more humane death compared to hanging.
As per the article, there hasn’t been an execution in South Carolina since May 2011. Since then, the number of death row inmates lowered from 60 to 37.
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