Utahs firing squad law explained as Tyler Robinsons potential fate revealed

Utah is one of just five states that still allows the execution of criminals by firing squad — and if its last such killing in 2010 is any indication, Tyler Robinson could end up with a little paper white target over his heart and shot by five law-enforcement volunteers with rifles.Unbeknownst to the executioners, one would fire a dummy bullet so they wouldn’t know exactly who killed Charlie Kirk’s accused assassin.Utah is one of five states with the unusual execution method on its books, which it most recently used 15 years ago on convicted murderer Ronnie Lee Gardner. The Beehive State is also one of only two states to put a convict to death by firing squad since the end of the nationwide moratorium in 1977.The other, South Carolina, executed convicted double murderer Brad Sigmon by the method in March.

However, the legal process now facing Robinson, 22, has some way to go before that point, as Utah does not regularly sentence prisoners to death — and those who are may spend decades on death row.In August, Ralph Leroy Menzies was spared execution by firing squad by the state’s Supreme Court after his defense attorneys argued he had dementia.Menzies, 67, was set to be executed on Sept.5 for the 1986 abduction and killing of Utah mother of three Maurine Hunsaker.When he was first sentenced to death, Menzies requested a firing squad, but last year, his lawyers launched a new push to free their client, arguing that his 37 years on death row have seen him reduced to using a wheelchair, dependent on oxygen and unable to say why he is being executed.In 2004, lawmakers in Utah stopped offering inmates the choice of firing squad, saying they attracted intense media interest and took attention away from victims.But in 2015, then-Utah Gov.

Gary Herbert gave his approval to a law bringing back firing squads as a backup if costly lethal injection drugs aren’t available.Unlike with lethal injection, the organs can be used from inmates killed by a firing squad.Whe...