House OKs bill against firing squad

The Salt Lake Tribune ^ | January 27, 2004 | Rebecca Walsh

[yonif]

State Rep. Sheryl Allen has been waiting for this -- for seven years.
    A convincing majority of Utah House members voted Monday for Allen's legislation to eliminate the firing squad as an execution option for condemned killers.
    The Bountiful Republican tried to pursuade her colleagues to do away with the choice in 1996 after convicted murderer John Albert Taylor's request for a firing squad death created an international media frenzy. But Allen eventually dropped the bill for lack of support.
    This year, spurred on by three more death-row inmates' requests for a firing squad, Allen tried again. She said she wants to quash media circuses like those that surrounded past executions.
    "When we have used the firing squad, it has been a magnet for international attention," Allen said. "The attention is on the method of the execution, not the crime that was committed, or the victim, or the victim's family."
    Stansbury Park Democratic Sen. Ron Allen is sponsoring similar legislation in the Senate.
    Utah death-row inmates can choose between the firing squad and lethal injection. Only two other states -- Idaho and Oklahoma -- still execute prisoners using a firing squad. But in those states, the inmates cannot choose. Three Utah inmates -- Troy Michael Kell, Ronald Lafferty and Ralph Menzies -- also have requested a firing squad.
    When Taylor was executed seven years ago for raping and strangling 11-year-old Charla King in Washington Terrace, dozens of television crews, including reporters from France, Italy and Japan, came to town to film Wild West "frontier justice." Taylor was the first inmate in the United States to die by firing squad since Utah executed Gary Gilmore in 1977.
    State Rep. Greg Hughes, R-Draper, said such publicity isn't necessarily a bad thing. He argued against Allen's bill. "I fear we have this desire to sanitize the process, so it's not too offensive for our senses," he said. "It's like trying to put alcohol on a cotton ball and rubbing it on the [inmate's] arm before you give the lethal injection.
    "We should make no bones about it, if it's something we believe in."
    But Salt Lake City Democratic Rep. Scott Daniels doesn't believe in the death penalty. And he pleaded in vain with House members not to worry about the mode of execution, but to do away with capital punishment altogether.
    "The question here is a little more fundamental," he said. "History will look back on us, and our children and grandchildren will say, 'Why did they think it was OK?' Whether it's done with lethal injection or another method, it's fundamentally wrong. Should we as a society be stooping to their level and taking away life?"
    But Daniels is one of few legislators opposed to the death penalty. And Allen's task became a little easier last September when officials of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints said they would not object to doing away with the firing squad. Some Mormons believe murderers' blood must be spilled to make up for their crimes -- so-called "blood atonement," an idea taught by some early church leaders but never practiced by the church.
    After adopting an amendment by Spanish Fork GOP Rep. Mike Morley to reinstate the firing squad if U.S. courts ever conclude lethal injection is unconstitutional, 57 of 73 House members voted to send Allen's bill on to the Senate.
    walsh@sltrib.com
   
   
   

[Dante3]

I have no objection to killer's getting their choice as to type of execution even though subhumans, such as the Carr brothers, deserve to be tortured just as they tortured their innocent victims.

[lilylangtree]

What's wrong with a firing squad? A criminal knows that he's not going to live with 10 guns shooting at him at 10-20 feet away. That's better than hanging.

[Rytwyng]

I'm all for firing squads, but it should be done differently. Since the %^&$#^*& liberals want guns registered, we can use the gun registration lists in a way liberals will hate: to randomly pick armed citizens for firing squad duty, just as citizens are currently picked from voter rolls for jury duty.

[bobjam]

I like that. Firing squad duty. Just imagine the fuss the frogs and euroweenies would make. Heck, we could make it a fundraiser for the crime victim's family as potential gunners would raise money to pay for a spot on the squad. Anyone who wants to be one the squad (and pre-qualifies with his weapon and skill) could collect pledges from neighbors, coworkers, family and friends- much in the same way people raise money for other causes. The ten highest pledge getters get to blow the criminal away.

[TexasRepublic]

I wish Texas would ban execution by injection and bring back public hanging. If even one innocent life was saved because a potential perp had second thoughts about hanging, it would be justified. Execution ought to be truely feared by the criminal. Injection is an easy out.

[BipolarBob]

I am really incensed that one more right of convicted murderers is being taken away. Just Say No to these horrible people that think it's okay to trample on the rights of ruthless maddog killers. What does that say about us as a nation or the world? They should have right to be lined up against the wall and have their a$$ shot off. Are you with me on this one?


sarcasm,but the good kind/