Officially given the green light in South Carolina to be shot as one of the methods used to execute death row inmates. The shock measure was approved in May last year to overcome difficulties in locating the poison compound needed for lethal injections, as many pharmaceutical companies had banned their exports to the US on humanitarian grounds. For this reason, the last execution in South Carolina was in 2011. Until now, those convicted who had been given the choice between the injection and the electric chair had chosen the former, effectively avoiding their execution.
South Carolina’s prison authorities have announced that the renovation of Columbia’s “death chamber” has been completed and Attorney General Alan Wilson has officially given the goahead for execution as a method of carrying out death sentences. According to CBS, there is now a metal chair in the room for the inmate who chooses the firing squad to sit on. About four meters from the position there is a wall with a rectangular opening through which three gunmen will shoot the condemned man. Among the proponents of the shock measure is Democratic Senator Dick Harpootlian, a former prosecutor turned criminal defense attorney, who says shooting is “the least painful and humane method there is.”