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Post by Rev. Agave on Jun 8, 2010 21:11:40 GMT -6
www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jcG2jswjiPsecYqOzl7rOOqwVE6AD9G7F88O0At inmate's request, Utah prepares firing squad By JENNIFER DOBNER (AP) – 1 hour ago
SALT LAKE CITY — Barring a last-minute reprieve, Ronnie Lee Gardner will be strapped into a chair, a hood will be placed over his head and a small white target will be pinned over his heart.
The order will come: "Ready, aim..."
The 49-year-old convicted killer will be executed by a team of five anonymous marksmen firing with a matched set of .30-caliber rifles. He is to be the third person executed by firing squad in Utah — or anywhere else in the U.S. — since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976.
Utah was a long holdout in keeping the method, which it has used in 40 of its 49 executions in the last 160 years. Utah lawmakers made lethal injection the default method of execution in 2004, but inmates condemned before then can still choose the firing squad.
That's what Gardner did in April, politely telling a judge, "I would like the firing squad, please." Neither he nor his attorneys have said why.
Critics decry the firing squad as a barbaric method that should have been relegated to the dustbin of the frontier era.
"The firing squad is archaic, it's violent, and it simply expands on the violence that we already experience from guns as a society," Bishop John C. Wester, of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City, said during an April protest. The diocese is part of a new coalition pushing for alternatives to capital punishment in Utah.
Even some death-penalty supporters would prefer not to see the method used. State Rep. Sheryl Allen, a Republican from Bountiful who pushed for the switch to lethal injection, said she's not happy to see the reprise of the firing squad because it shifts attention away from the victim to the convicted killer.
Gardner is to be executed June 18, shortly after midnight. He was convicted of capital murder 25 years ago for the 1985 fatal courthouse shooting of attorney Michael Burdell during a botched escape attempt.
Allen said legislators allowed previously convicted inmates to keep the firing-squad option out of fear that changing the execution method would create a new avenue of appeal.
Utah's switch to lethal injection was largely driven by an aversion to the negative worldwide publicity it received each time a firing squad was used, including the case of Gary Gilmore. The convicted killer famously proclaimed "Let's do it" before his 1977 execution by a firing squad. Gilmore's story inspired author Norman Mailer's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, "The Executioner's Song."
Utah last used the firing squad in 1996 to execute John Albert Taylor, who was convicted of the 1989 rape and strangulation of an 11-year-old girl. It is the only state that allows execution by firing squad, though Oklahoma law calls for that method if both lethal injection and electrocution are deemed unconstitutional.
Citing security concerns, officials with the Utah Department of Corrections declined to be interviewed by The Associated Press about the specifics of Gardner's execution and referred the AP to a department memo released in April that included some limited details.
In its planning, the department will likely rely heavily on a manual for conducting executions — by firing squad and lethal injection — written in 1986 by Gary DeLand, who ran Utah's corrections agency in 1985-92 and was later tapped to rebuild Iraq's prison system.
DeLand planned three executions for the state of Utah, including one for Gardner in the 1990s that was delayed by a court order two days before the scheduled date.
Based on DeLand's own description of the planning, written accounts of past executions and the recollections of former department employees, at some point in the 24 hours before the execution, Gardner will be moved from his 6-by-12-foot, maximum-security cell to a deathwatch cell where he can be more closely monitored by guards.
After Gardner is allowed the customary last meal and visitors, prison guards will strip search him and give him a dark-colored prison jumpsuit to wear to the 20-by-24-foot execution chamber.
Inside, Gardner will be strapped into a winged, black metal chair with a mesh seat that was built for Taylor's execution. A metal tray beneath the chair is designed to collect any blood that runs from the executed prisoner's body.
For Taylor's execution, sandbags were stacked behind the chair to catch any stray bullets.
Aside from staff, as many as 25 individuals may witness the execution from three observation rooms that surround the execution chamber, according to the department memo. The witnesses include relatives of the victims, representatives for the state, news media and individuals selected by Gardner.
Once the witnesses are in place, the prison warden will open the curtains on the observation room windows. Gardner will be asked for any last words.
Then, after a final check for a stay with the Utah attorney general's office, comes the order to the executioners, who fire from a distance of about 25 feet.
The gunmen stand behind a wall cut with a gunport, their rifles bench-rested to assure accuracy, DeLand said.
The guns are handed out randomly to the officers. One will be loaded with a blank, so no one will know who fired the fatal shot. By law, the identities of those selected for the firing squad remain secret.
A state judge signed the warrant ordering Gardner's execution on April 23. That launched a flurry of legal filings by attorneys aimed at getting Gardner's death sentence reduced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
So far those attempts have been unsuccessful, although the Utah Supreme Court is scheduled to hear an appeal on Wednesday and the state parole board is to begin a two-day commutation hearing Thursday.
Gardner and his attorneys can continue to try and stop the execution up until midnight on June 17, Assistant Utah Attorney General Tom Brunker said.
No matter what happens in Gardner's case, America's last execution by firing squad could be years off. At least three of the other nine men on Utah's death row have said they want to die that way, too.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 8, 2010 22:18:31 GMT -6
A few responses...
The Utah Legislature abolished the firing squad for new DR inmates because it fears the world wide attention, and complaints they are stepping back into frontier times. Well, merely calling the firing squad is archaic is not a valid argument. Blasting it as violent, is a value judgement, because all executions are violent. I think the real offence is that it is not sterile and clean for the viewers. It doesn't make any difference to the inmate
Why would an inmate choose the firing squad..
maybe a sense of history.. lethal injection is kind of wimpy...
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Post by Rev. Agave on Jun 9, 2010 0:31:10 GMT -6
Why does it matter how this man Gardner chooses to die? Let this man pay his debt to society. At least he has a chance to say his goodbye to his family and his friends. He has a chance to make peace with his God. That is more than he gave his victim. It matters because this could be the last American execution by firing squad EVER. Moreover, he can never come close to paying the debt he owes to society. The best we can do is shoot him dead, but that does not mean we're even. As to your last point, he has no chance at making peace with God. Yes, he has the chance to TRY to make peace, but he is going STRAIGHT to Hell no matter how hard he prays. Anyway, I am looking forward to his death and I think it is cool that he will be executed by firing squad. His death will be quick, but I am confident that he will feel the trauma of the bullets blasting through his chest before he dies. Even if it is only a few seconds, I am sure it will be really painful.
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Post by The Tipsy Broker on Jun 9, 2010 0:59:25 GMT -6
Instead of a white target they ought use a smiley face sticker like this one
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Post by davebowman on Jun 9, 2010 1:37:27 GMT -6
All the preperation necessary... Utah can learn something from China in terms of efficiency. However I do not think this one will get through.
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Post by redfoxx13 on Jun 9, 2010 2:25:52 GMT -6
Why does it matter how this man Gardner chooses to die? Let this man pay his debt to society. At least he has a chance to say his goodbye to his family and his friends. He has a chance to make peace with his God. That is more than he gave his victim. It matters because this could be the last American execution by firing squad EVER. Moreover, he can never come close to paying the debt he owes to society. The best we can do is shoot him dead, but that does not mean we're even. As to your last point, he has no chance at making peace with God. Yes, he has the chance to TRY to make peace, but he is going STRAIGHT to Hell no matter how hard he prays. Anyway, I am looking forward to his death and I think it is cool that he will be executed by firing squad. His death will be quick, but I am confident that he will feel the trauma of the bullets blasting through his chest before he dies. Even if it is only a few seconds, I am sure it will be really painful. So what if he's the last American executed by firing squad? (If it's his goal to be remembered in history that way I personally find it repugnant.) Dead is dead, no matter how he's executed. I REFUSE to PARTICIPATE in making a celebrity out of him. Obviously, he can NEVER repay his debt to society. He will NEVER be able to undo all the loss, pain, and devestation he's caused his murder victims loved ones. That goes without saying. HE will pay, however, with the only currency he has left. He will pay with his life. (Of which I'm certain is none too fulfilling.) I have no sympathy for Ronnie Lee Gardner. I do know one thing, though. I will not rejoice in his death. I will not mourn his passing. I don't find any of this the least bit "cool" or amusing. I hope his victims loved ones can find as much peace and closure as possible. As to what will happen to him after he dies, speculate all you like. I WILL NOT. That's not my department.
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Post by spinaltap on Jun 9, 2010 3:32:21 GMT -6
Bang, lights out, next
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Post by Charlene on Jun 9, 2010 8:20:20 GMT -6
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Post by Charlene on Jun 9, 2010 8:32:34 GMT -6
Found my own answer:
While at court on murder charges, Gardner tried to escape, killing Michael Burdell
Ronnie Lee Gardner tried to escape on April 2, 1985, from the now-demolished courthouse at 250 E. 400 South, Salt Lake City. He had been brought there for a hearing on charges in the 1984 robbery and slaying of Melvyn John Otterstrom, who he shot once in the face at Cheers Tavern in Salt Lake City.
After a woman slipped Gardner a gun, a prison guard who was escorting the inmate shot him in the shoulder. Gardner fatally shot attorney Michael Burdell and wounded bailiff Nick Kirk before being captured on the courthouse lawn. He was convicted of aggravated capital murder for killing Burdell and sentenced to death.
Gardner also was charged with capital murder for killing Otterstrom, a husband and father who was a controller for the Utah Paper Box Co. by day and a part-time bartender in the evening. He pleaded guilty to second-degree murder as part of a plea bargain and received a sentence of five years to life in prison.
Darcy Perry McCoy -- who testified under a grant of immunity in the Otterstrom case that she helped Gardner plan a robbery and waited for him in a car outside Cheers the night of the killing -- originally was accused of handing off the gun at the courthouse. But her sister, Carma Jolley Hainsworth, who was married to Gardner's cousin, ultimately was charged with the crime.
Hainsworth has stood by her story that McCoy gave the gun to Gardner but eventually pleaded guilty to aiding in an escape and was sentenced to one to 15 years in prison. She did admit collecting clothes that were found in a women's restroom at the courthouse inside a tote bag, along with duct tape and a knife -- items that Gardner said were part of his plan to bind the guards and escape.
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Post by ltdc on Jun 9, 2010 9:02:27 GMT -6
purely, purely for selfish reasons, I'm kinda hoping they don't let the air out of gardner.
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