South Carolina makes firing squad an option for death row inmate executions

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

52% : Protocols have been written, and the department is ready to carry out an order of execution by firing squad if the inmate chooses this method," the South Carolina Department of Corrections stated in a press release.
45% : In 2021, South Carolina adopted a law that made the electric chair the state's "primary means of execution" but also gave inmates the option of death by firing squad or lethal injection "if those methods are available," according to the Department of Corrections.
45% : The court said that Brad Sigmon, 63, and Freddie Owens, 43, couldn't be put to death until the choices of execution provided under the new law were actually available.
40% : Attorneys for Sigmon and Owens have argued that their clients can't be put to death by electrocution or firing squad because they were sentenced under the law that made lethal injection the default method of execution in South Carolina.

*Our bias meter rating uses data science including sentiment analysis, machine learning and our proprietary algorithm for determining biases in news articles. Bias scores are on a scale of -100% to 100% with higher negative scores being more liberal and higher positive scores being more conservative, and 0% being neutral. The rating is an independent analysis and is not affiliated nor sponsored by the news source or any other organization.