a state of USA is one step away from passing a law that would allow jailers to appeal to the firing squads for whom it is are sentenced to death.
(Read here: A prisoner convicted of murders is executed in Florida)
Although in that country there are already several states that authorize this method, it is an unprecedented event when several American civil and political rights organizations warn about a practice that they consider “dreadful” and “archaic”.
(See also: Secret executions carried out by Saudi Arabia)
This week, the Idaho Parliament passed the law giving the green light to this method. By a vote of 24 votes to 11, the approved text only needs to be sanctioned by the governor of the state to be ratified.
Why a firing squad?
Idaho already contemplates execution by lethal injection for those who were sentenced to the death penalty. However, many times the state authorities claim to have difficulties in obtaining the substances needed to prepare the injection.
pharmaceutical laboratories they do not want to be associated with the death penalty and the components are often in short supply. In that case, the prison authorities could go to the firing squad when they do not have the injection, as contemplated in the approved norm.
People executed by firing squad are likely to suffer extreme levels of pain and torture
Once the governor signs the bill into law, Idaho, a state of two million people in the northwest of the country, would become the fifth estate in allowing state-mandated executions. Mississippi, Oklahoma, Utah, and South Carolina They already have this form of execution in their constitutions.
And although in Eunited states The death penalty is often the subject of heated debate and many advocate its abolitionsome methods of execution also tend to be more criticized than others.
“People executed by firing squad are likely to suffer extreme levels of pain and torture,” the civil rights organization Aclu warned in a statement.
According to the television network Telemundo, Republican Senator Doug Ricks, one of the bill’s co-sponsors, said he “believes” that death by firing squad is “humane” and believes it is key that the system “make sure it works.”
In contrast, Dan Foreman, also a Republican, said that this practice will “traumatize” those who carry it out.those who witness them and those who are in charge of cleaning tasks.
“I have seen the consequences of the shootings and it is psychologically damaging for anyone who witnesses them,” Foreman emphasized according to statements collected by Telemundo. “Shooting is below the dignity of the state of Idaho,” he added.
Who has been sentenced to firing squad and what are the other methods of execution in the United States?
To get an overview of the situation, in that country only three people have been sentenced to firing squad since 1976. Among those convicted are two men and one woman, according to official figures from the Death Penalty Information Center.
The last of these was Ronnie Lee Gardner in 2010, who of his own free will asked to be shot in Utah. Lee Gardner spent 25 years on death row awaiting execution after being convicted of killing a man during an escape attempt.
When the judge asked him what his last wish was, he replied: “I’d like the firing squad, please.” Since then, the United States has not executed a firing squad for 13 years, but the law in Idaho opens the door for new cases to be filed.
I have seen the aftermath of shootings and it is psychologically damaging to anyone who witnesses them.
Since the Americans reinstated the death penalty in 1976, a total of 1,387 people have been executed by lethal injection; 163, by the electric chair; 11, due to gas asphyxia; 3 by hanging and 3 by firing squad.
Currently, as reported by the Death Penalty Information Center, 24 states have the death penalty in their legislation. Another 23 do not have it contemplated, while the remaining three do, but the current governors applied a moratorium so as not to partially execute the convicted.
This sentence is highly approved by American society, since according to CNN, by 2019 close to 65 percent of citizens approved the application of death sentences.
Currently, the application of the death penalty is in force especially for homicides, since in a common denominator of the laws of The United States considers that it is a “form of reparation for the victims”.
Typically, those convicted of this crime spend at least 10 years in a death row trial, including the appeals processes many seek to lengthen and try to avoid capital punishment.
Even so, states have the freedom to choose the homicide cases in which the death penalty is applicable, as is often the case in the murder of minors, which in most cases is punishable by death.
CARLOS JOSE REYES GARCIA
INTERNATIONAL SUB-EDITOR
TIME
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