South Carolina death penalty methods are legal, including firing squad, state's high court rules

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

52% : Lawyers for the inmates did tell the justices in February that lethal injection appears to be legal when it follows proper protocols, with information about the drug given to the condemned in a manner that matches what other states and the federal government use.
44% : Nearly all inmates have chosen lethal injection.
44% : The state's supplies of drugs for lethal injections expired and no pharmaceutical companies would sell more if they could be publicly identified.
44% : Prosecutors have sent only three new prisoners to death row in the past 13 years.
43% : South Carolina used to carry out an average of three executions a year and had more than 60 inmates on death row when the last execution was carried out in 2011.
42% : The state said in its argument before the state Supreme Court in February that lethal injection, electrocution and firing squad all fit existing death penalty protocols.
41% : South Carolina can execute death row inmates by firing squad, lethal injection or the electric chair, the state's high court ruled Wednesday, opening the door to restart executions after more than a decade.
35% : This decision follows arguments from lawyers representing a group of people on death row that the electric chair and firing squad are cruel and unusual punishments.

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