Governor signs bill re-introducing firing squad
Gov. Gary Herbert signed 55 bills into law Monday, including one allowing execution by firing squad as an alternative method of capital punishment.
Sponsored by a Republican House and Senate representative, the bill allows the use of firing squad if the drugs needed for a lethal injection are unavailable.
Sen. Lyle Hillyard, R-Logan, said he fully supports the bill and anticipated that the governor would sign it but would like to see progress on broadening what compounds can be used for lethal injections.
“I’m not a doctor, (and) I don’t know anyting about this, but I’ve had doctors tell me that there’s lots of different chemicals (that can be used),” Hillyard said.
The governor’s office asked Hillyard a few years ago to carry a bill that would broaden that definition, but the bill never became public due to this session’s firing squad legislation.
Rep. Ed Redd, R-Logan, said an underlying issue, besides whether or not capitol punishment should be legal, is how to make the drugs needed for a lethal injection more available. Because of the European-led boycott of lethal injection drugs, a growing number of pharmaceutical companies are unable to export the compounds, making it difficult for the state to attain them.
“The question is how do we take care of that in the state of Utah,” Redd said. “My understanding is that it’s a difficult, complicated manner to get the drug to cause the lethal injection, at least in the current system.”
Although Hillyard and Redd agreed that alternative compounds can be used to create a lethal injection, Redd said the use of firing squads is unnecessary.
“We put men on the moon and have amazing technology, but we can’t figure out how to take a person’s life? That’s a complicated approach,” he said.
Redd said as a physician, he’s had experience with gun shot wounds which suggest to him that death by firing squad may not be as quick or painless as some may believe.
“Inflicting unnecessary pain on another human being … in the process of deciding that we’re going to stop them from living, do we have to be violent?” he said. “Do we have to inflict enormous amounts of pain during that process?”
Several members of USU Democrats weighed in on the issue via email to The Utah Statesman, but most noted their take on the legality of the death penalty in general.
“At first I understand passing the bill for firing squads because past drugs used for injections are hard to acquire and experimenting with new ones has been disastrous,” wrote Calvin Makelky, a sophomore majoring in statistics. “But come on, we’re better than this. It’s insane we’re still arguing over how best to kill people when the death penalty is outdated, ineffective, unfairly applied and arguably cruel and unusual.”
Utah stopped offering the choice of firing squad to inmates on death row in 2004. Hillyard emphasized that the legislation passed Monday does not reinstate that choice and that a firing squad will only be used if a lethal injection is unavailable.
Although some students may not be invested in the legislative actions of Utah representatives, Redd said students should be aware of these issues.
“The future generations are you,” he said. “(It’s) the 18, 19, 20-year-old people at Utah State University that will be living with the consequences of the laws we pass right now.”
— manda.perkins@hotmail.com
Twitter: @perkins_manda