A South Carolina firing squad has executed a man Friday, the third person to die by that method in the state this year.
Three prison employees, all with live ammunition, volunteered to carry out the execution of Stephen Bryant, 44, who was pronounced dead at 6:05 p.m. Bryant killed three people in five days in a rural area of the state in 2004.
Bryant chose to die by firing squad instead of lethal injection or the electric chair. He made no final statement and briefly glanced toward the 10 witnesses before the hood was placed on his head.
The shots rang out about 55 seconds later. Bryant made no noise. The red bullseye target that marks the location of his heart flew forward off his chest. He had a few shallow breaths and then a final spasm a little over a minute later. A doctor checked him with a stethoscope for a minute before he pronounced Bryant dead.
A media witness said after the execution that a pool of wetness emerged on Bryant’s chest where he was shot. Three family members of victims who served as witnesses held hands during the execution.
Bryant is the seventh person put to death by South Carolina in 14 months after the state had a 13-year pause in executions when it couldn’t obtain lethal injection drugs.
Republican Gov. Henry McMaster denied clemency for Bryant, according to his office. No South Carolina governor has offered clemency since the death penalty resumed in the U.S. in 1976.
Final meal and memory
For his final meal, Bryant had spicy mixed seafood stir-fry, fried fish over rice, egg rolls, stuffed shrimp, two candy bars and German chocolate cake.
Bo King, a lawyer who works on death penalty cases in South Carolina, said Bryant had a genetic disorder, was a victim of sexual and physical abuse by relatives, and his mother’s binge drinking “permanently damaged his body and brain.”
“Mr. Bryant’s impairments left him unable to endure the tormenting memories of his childhood,” King wrote in a statement.
King said Bryant “showed grace and courage in forgiving his family and great love for those in and outside of his prison.”
“We will remember his unlikely friendships, his fierce protectiveness, and his love for nature, the water, and the world,” King wrote.
Firing squad vs. lethal injection drugs
The firing squad has a long and violent history around the world. Death by a hail of bullets has been used to punish mutinies and desertion in armies, as frontier justice in America’s Old West and as a tool of terror and political repression in the former Soviet Union and Nazi Germany.
But in recent years, it’s been revived in the U.S. Some lawmakers say it’s the quickest and most humane way to execute a person.
That’s since a number of botched executions by other methods, including lethal injection drugs. South Carolina and other states have struggled to maintain adequate supplies of lethal injection drugs.
In part because of this, South Carolina paused executions for 13 years. The state then restarted in September 2024, after which four men have been executed by lethal injection and three by firing squad. The state is among several where the electric chair is still legal.
