Fort Hood Shooter’s Firing Squad Execution Could Reshape US Death Penalty, Expert Says

The planned firing-squad execution of Fort Hood mass shooter Nidal Malik Hasan could open the door to more executions by gunfire in the United States, according to a leading death penalty expert. She said the method could gain momentum if the military’s upcoming execution proceeds smoothly.

“I think it’s highly likely that if the firing squad is successful here — and by successful, we still don’t always know what a person is experiencing, but let’s say it is a very quick execution — it seems conceivable that it would be used for other inmates as well,” Fordham Law Professor Deborah Denno, an authority on capital punishment, told News Outlet.

Idaho, Utah and South Carolina are among the states that in recent years have turned to the firing squad as a possible execution method as lethal injection faces growing concerns.

The Trump administration announced earlier this week that Hasan would be executed by firing squad. He was sentenced to death in 2013 after a 2009 mass shooting at the Army base left 13 people dead and 32 others wounded.

The Pentagon confirmed to News Outlet on Thursday that authorities plan to livestream the sentence when it is carried out on Dec. 3.

“The firing squad is viewed as more certain,” Denno said. “It is considered faster and is also what I call the least inhumane method of execution.”

Denno said condemned prisoners executed by firing squad are believed to experience less pain than those subjected to lethal injection or other forms of capital punishment.

She also noted that skilled marksmen are more readily available and generally better trained than personnel involved in other execution methods.

“We have an endless supply of people who are experts in shooting, either professionally because they are police officers, corrections officers or something similar,” she said. “We also have people who are excellent, superb marksmen because shooting is a hobby or for some other reason. So it is not difficult to find someone willing to do this.”

The Army says the last U.S. military execution was that of Pvt. John A. Bennett on April 13, 1961, at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. Bennett was hanged after being convicted of rape and attempted murder.

Denno has previously described the firing squad as the most humane and effective execution method, pointing to its relatively limited history of complications in the United States.

In recent years, firing squads have regained support in some states that retain the death penalty, particularly amid concerns over the availability and reliability of lethal injection drugs.

Last week, a Tennessee death row inmate survived two doses of pentobarbital, becoming the first person in the modern era known to survive a lethal injection attempt. The incident renewed questions about whether lethal injection should remain a viable method of execution.

Christa Pike, 50, is recovering after the injections failed to kill her. She was sentenced to death for the 1995 torture and murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer in Knoxville.

Firing squads have generated far fewer controversies throughout American history, Denno said. Until recently, only two such incidents had been recorded — one in 1877 and another in 1951.

“There have not been that many firing squad executions, of course, but given everything about the method, the shooters should not be missing their target,” she said.

That was until last year, when questions arose surrounding the South Carolina execution of 42-year-old double murderer Mikal Mahdi, she said.

Mahdi killed two people in 2004. They were a store clerk named Christopher Boggs, whom Mahdi shot in the head while he was checking his ID, and off-duty officer James Myers, who was shot eight times and burned outside his own home.

The death row inmate had the option to choose lethal injection, electric chair or firing squad, and took the latter.

But after his execution, his lawyers raised concerns that none of the three bullets fired struck him in the heart as intended, prompting concerns that the cop-killer had been retaliated against.

“The shooters missed the intended target area and the evidence indicates that he was struck by only two bullets, not the prescribed three,” said Dr. Jonathan Arden, a forensic pathologist hired by Mahdi’s defense. “Consequently, the nature of the internal injuries from the gunshot wounds resulted in a more prolonged death process.”

The executioners in Mahdi’s case have not been publicly identified, but Denno said that they were presumably experienced shooters.

“This seems to be a really troublesome outcome, so it’s just something to pay attention to on December 3,” she said.