After 10 years and two weeks of downtime, South Carolina’s electric chair is once more ready to perform its duty.
That was the message delivered to the S.C. Supreme Court late this week by a lawyer hired by the State Department of Corrections.
“I have been authorized to alert the Supreme Court that, due to the recent amendment to S.C. Code Section 24-3-530, the Department now is now able to carry out executions by electrocution. Thank you in advance for your time and consideration,” wrote Columbia lawyer Daniel Plyler in a letter to the high court.
In the letter, Plyler said he “had been retained” by Corrections.
Copies of the letter were also addressed
three men who are nearing execution — Richard Moore, Brad Sigmon and Freddie Owens, as well as to their attorneys, according to the letter.
Earlier this month, the S.C. General Assembly tweaked the state’s death penalty law in hopes of eliminating a loophole that allowed inmates to indefinitely delay their executions.
Under the old law, a death row inmate had two choices: death by electrocution or death by lethal injection. The law said if an inmate wanted to die by lethal injection, the state could not force him to die by electrocution.
For years, since the state prison system said it could not obtain lethal drugs to carry out an execution, inmates chose lethal injection as their preferred way to die — knowing that the state could not force them to die by electrocution.
But the General Assembly has now eliminated that loophole. Lawmakers say the change in the law now allows the prison system to kill death row inmates by electrocution, even if they prefer lethal injection.
The newly revised law also has a provision for inmates to choose death by firing squad. However, Corrections does not yet have procedures for a firing squad.
Chrysti Shain, Corrections spokeswoman, released this statement Friday evening: “The S.C. Department of Corrections has informed the S.C. Supreme Court that it can carry out executions. The only method available at this time is the electric chair.
“The department is working to develop protocols and procedures to proceed with execution by firing squad and still has no lethal injections drugs. We are currently looking at other states for guidance in developing firing squad protocols,” she said.
Under state law, once the Corrections department notifies the Supreme Court it is ready to carry out an execution, the Supreme Court issues an execution notice to the inmate.
No notice had been sent out by the Supreme Court as of Friday.
Once the notices are sent out and received by the inmates, the executions will be scheduled for the fourth Friday following receipt.
A state senator who played a key role in getting the option of a firing squad inserted into the revised death penalty law this spring said Friday he doesn’t believe Corrections can carry out executions until there is a firing squad option in place, assuming the inmate would prefer a firing squad.
“They shouldn’t be electrocuting anybody until they have the alternative of a firing squad in place. If they aren’t doing that, they are violating the statute that we just passed,” said State Sen. Dick Harpootlian, D-Richland.
“If there are no drugs, Corrections must offer the inmate a choice between a firing squad and the electric chair — that is what we passed.”
South Carolina’s last execution was in May 2011.
, John Monk, May 22, 2021
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"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted." -- Oscar Wilde
