Richard Bernard Moore, 57, a two-decade death row inmate in South Carolina, on Friday elected to die by firing squad rather than in the electric chair in light of the scarcity of drugs needed for lethal-injection executions.
Moore is the first state prisoner to face the choice of execution methods after state legislators passed a law last year making electrocution South Carolina’s default method and giving inmates the option to face three volunteer prison workers armed with rifles trained on his heart.
Moore’s death is scheduled for April 29. Should it be carried out, he would be the first person put to death in the state since 2011, and the first firing squad execution in the U.S. since 2010. Utah remains the only state to have used the execution method in the last century, according to The Marshall Project.
But Moore’s attorneys have requested a stay on the execution while another court determines if either available execution option can be considered cruel or unusual punishment. Attorneys argue prison officials aren’t trying hard enough to obtain lethal injection drugs. According to reports, S.C. Corrections Director Bryan Stirling in an affidavit said his agency made efforts to get the drugs, but manufacturers will not sell them to the state.
Lawyers are also requesting the delay so the U.S. Supreme Court can also review whether the death sentence was a disproportionate punishment compared to similar crimes. The S.C. Supreme Court justices denied a similar appeal last week.
The state corrections agency recently completed development of protocols for firing squad executions and $53,600 in renovations to the death chamber in Columbia, where Moore is set to be executed. The death chamber features a metal chair with restraints that faces a wall with a rectangular opening15 feet away for the shooters.
South Carolina is one of eight states in the U.S. to still use the electric chair and one of four to allow a firing squad. Moore is one of 35 people on death row in the state. The last scheduled execution for Moore was set in 2020, but it was delayed after prison officials said they couldn’t obtain lethal injection drugs.
Prosecutors during Moore’s 2001 trial said he entered a Spartanburg store looking for money when he got into a dispute with store clerk James Mahoney, who pulled a pistol that Moore wrestled from him. Mahoney reportedly drew a second gun and shot Moore in the arm, and Moore then shot Mahoney in the chest, killing him.
Moore claimed his actions were in self-defense after Mahoney drew a firearm. His supporters argued his crime does not rise to the level of a death penalty offense due to the fact that Moore did not bring a gun into the store, lending to the idea that lacking a gun, he couldn’t have had intent to kill.
Pages from the Execution Book dated as far back as 1912, submitted to South Carolina news outlet The Island Packet, detail South Carolina’s many electrocution sentences. It’s a sobering read.
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