Two bills pertaining to firing squad executions for death row inmates won’t advance further this session unless the authors propose them as amendments to other bills.
Senate Bill 11 was heard in committee but never voted on and didn’t advance to the Senate floor. House Bill 1119 didn’t have enough votes on the final vote by the House.
Indiana University Maurer School of Law professor Jody Madeira said she was surprised that neither of the bills advanced, especially considering that Utah, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Idaho and South Carolina allow for firing squad executions.
“I think they were just unpalatable to state legislators,” Madeira said. “I’m actually a little surprised they failed because we have these provisions in other states.”
Senate Bill 11, filed by State Sen. Michael Young, would allow for firing squad executions if medications for lethal injection can’t be obtained or the inmate chooses death by firing squad at least 30 days before the scheduled execution date.
Under Senate Bill 11, the firing squad would be made up of five Department of Correction officers selected by the warden. The firing squad members’ identity would be kept confidential and not subject to discovery in civil or criminal lawsuits, according to the bill.
At the time of execution, four members will have guns with live ammunition and one member will have a gun with blank ammunition. The guns would be loaded without the members knowing who has what kind of ammunition, according to Senate Bill 11.
Young, R-Indianapolis, said in a statement that he filed the bill because it can cost up to $300,000 per dose of pentobarbital, which is used to conduct a lethal injection, and “often expire before they can be used.”
Senate Bill 11 was discussed in committee, but never voted on and didn’t make it to the Senate floor.
“It is unfortunate that Senate Bill 11 did not advance out of the Senate Committee on Corrections and Criminal Law,” Young said in an emailed statement on Tuesday. “The short session limited the time to fully vet the bill. Without these time limitations, I believe we would have been able to discuss an amendment and successfully moved the bill. Although the bill didn’t advance this year, it will be an important discussion to have next year because the state has five people on death row, four of which are considered competent for execution. Though the topic is important, Indiana is in a position where we can wait. I am not going to abandon the issue, and I look forward to working on it again next year.”
House Bill 1119, authored by State Rep. Jim Lucas, R-Seymour, would’ve allowed for a jail warden to select three people to carry out a firing squad execution and each shooter would have live ammunition. The identities of the firing squad members would also be confidential amid any litigation, according to the bill.
House Bill 1119 had been amended by the House to remove nitrogen hypoxia as an execution option, mental health screening requirements for members of the execution team, and to allow at least one member of the media to watch the execution.
Lucas said capital punishment has been a part of Indiana’s history since before it was established as a state in 1816. Capital punishment has evolved from hanging, to electric chair, to lethal injection, Lucas said, and now states are considering firing squads.
“All House Bill 1119 does is evolve, like we have for centuries, and provides another method to carry out capital punishment in the form of a firing squad,” Lucas said. “I understand this is a sensitive topic. The actual issue is not the death penalty … this issue right now is amending existing Indiana law to include another method.”
Lucas said he filed the bill after learning about the cost of lethal injection.
Gov. Mike Braun disclosed in June that Indiana officials spent $1.175 million on lethal injection doses over the past year — $600,000 of which was spent on drugs that expired before use. The cost has been between $275,000 and $300,000 per dose, according to the Indiana Capital Chronicle.
State Rep. Matt Pierce, D-Bloomington, said the bill was amended from its initial premise that lethal injection drugs are expensive and hard to procure to allow for the Indiana Department of Correction to decide if they want to use lethal injection or firing squad.
“I would hope that our society has advanced a bit since our state was founded and would find a firing squad to be a barbaric way to perform an execution,” Pierce said. “We should be asking ourselves do we really think that our criminal justice system … is so perfect that it can perform an execution and not risk killing an innocent person.”
State Rep. Robert Morris, R-Fort Wayne, said using a firing squad as a form of execution would be “taking a step backwards.” Morris said there are organizations throughout the country that have been able to prove death row inmates were wrongfully convicted.
“I’m against every means of capital punishment until this body can debate it,” Morris said.
State Rep. Vernon Smith, D-Gary, said he found the bill “deeply troubling,” because shooting by firing squad “is a brutal, painful way to die.”
House Bill 1119 failed on a third reading vote last week. The final vote was 48-47, so the bill failed for lack of constitutional majority.
In total, 19 Republicans joined all present Democrats to vote against the bill. State Reps. Hal Slager, R-Schererville, Julie Olthoff, R-Crown Point, and Ed Soliday, R-Valparaiso, voted against the bill, while State Rep. Mike Aylesworth, R-Heborn, voted in favor of the bill.
State Rep. Ragen Hatcher, D-Gary, released a statement after the vote that, as a former prosecutor, she was glad the bill failed.
“It has no place in our justice system, which is centered on a mutual respect for human life. Our justice system isn’t about retribution,” Hatcher said.
The death penalty is “a flawed, irrevocable practice,” as “race, socioeconomic class and the skill of an attorney” impact each conviction, Hatcher said. If it had passed, the bill would have expedited executions, she said.
“Our justice system isn’t perfect. The system isn’t immune to bias or mistakes, and once a life is taken it can’t be returned. Hundreds of individuals sentenced to death have (been) exonerated with additional DNA testing or with new evidence,” Hatcher said. “Indiana corrections should be about justice and rehabilitation, not about finding the cheapest, most efficient, most painful way for the state to kill someone.”
As the session continues through the end of the month, Madeira said it’s unlikely that either of the bills will be added to another bill as an amendment because that would “draw bipartisan opposition.”
