S.C. Supreme Court upholds state executions, options on methods of death

July 31 (UPI) -- The South Carolina Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday that the state could give death row inmates the choice of ending their lives via a firing squad or electric chair.

By giving inmates a choice, the court said, the options should not be considered cruel or unusual, thereby allowing the executions to take place.

The state legislature OK'd such options in 2021 after the Department of Corrections could no longer obtain the drugs needed to carry out lethal injection executions. Death penalty opponents immediately tied up the law in court.

"In the context of the constitutional principle that our state may carry out the death penalty on those on whom it has been lawfully imposed, the choice cannot be considered cruel because the condemned inmate may elect to have the state employ the method he or his lawyers believe will cause him the least pain," Justice John Cannon Few wrote in the majority opinion, according to the Post and Courier.

Four South Carolina death row inmates sued to challenge the law , charging that the state forcing them to pick between the choice was cruel and unusual punishment. A South Carolina circuit court initially agreed, saying the measure violated the prohibition on the infliction of cruel, corporeal, or unusual punishment, ruling it unconstitutional.

The state later said it was able to secure the lethal injection drugs in 2022 after the state legislature passed a "shield statute" to hide the name of the drugs' providers.