Life and death row

[Kerry111]

I'm watching this series at the moment. There's lots of controversy over the drug used to carry out the lethal injection for the death penalty. I'm not pro death penalty but with such a gun culture in USA why don't they use a gun instead of lethal injection? Just wandering.

Who would want that job? May have made this up but is it two people that administrator the different drugs with lethal injection? I think the programme really illustrated the issue with the death penalty. Surely it would be better for the victims families to know the offender had been given life without parole than going through that rigmarole every few years and reliving all that pain each time

The crimes are awful, just awful and there’s no doubt that the perpetrators need punishment but the death sentence is a step too far for me.

Some states did use a firing squad. The last prisoner executed by firing squad was Ronnie Lee Gardner (who requested this method of execution) in 2010 in the state of Utah.

Utah enacted legislation in 2015 allowing execution by firing squad if the drugs they use are unavailable, Oklahoma also has firing squad as a secondary method of execution. I think it is also available in Mississippi.

I watched this with my 18 year son last week. I found it fascinating, but harrowing. The prisoner was the first person to be executed in 12 years in that state, and the first of many.

I know some commit heinous crimes, but I do feel the death penalty is wrong.