By MICHAEL TARM AP Legal Affairs WriterCHICAGO — The image of gunmen in a row firing in unison at a 
condemned prisoner may conjure up a bygone, less enlightened era.But the idea of using firing squads is making a comeback. Idaho lawmakers passed a bill this week seeking to add the state <a href="https://apnews.com/article/idaho-firing-squad-executions-410bd284ffbdb50d3b4a162fe8088dad?utm_source=homepage&amp;utm_medium=TopNews&amp;utm_campaign=position_07">to the list of those authorizing firing squads</a>, which currently includes Mississippi, Utah, Oklahoma and <a href="https://apnews.com/article/business-prisons-executions-south-carolina-f15a16e6186543e2fc1d93432ef1c614">South Carolina</a>.Fresh interest comes as states scramble for alternatives to lethal injections <a href="https://apnews.com/article/5f4ef9172ded4399a6123b25dbd1de4b">after pharmaceutical companies barred</a> the use of their drugs.<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2019/11/1574704569197.png" alt="" />
 <figcaption></figcaption>
 </figure>Some,
 including a few Supreme Court justices, view firing squads as less 
cruel than lethal injections, despite the violence involved in riddling 
bodies with bullets. Others say it's not so cut-and-dry, or that there 
are other factors to consider.A look at the status of firing squads in the United States:WHEN WAS THE LAST EXECUTION BY FIRING SQUAD?Ronnie
 Lee Gardner was executed at Utah State Prison on June 18, 2010, for 
killing an attorney during a courthouse escape attempt.Gardner 
sat in a chair, sandbags around him and a target pinned over his heart. 
Five prison staffers drawn from a pool of volunteers fired from 25 feet 
(about 8 meters) away with .30-caliber rifles. Gardner was pronounced 
dead two minutes later.A blank cartridge was loaded into one 
rifle without anyone knowing which. That's partly done to enable those 
bothered later by their participation to believe they may not have fired
 a fatal bullet.Utah is the only state to have used firing squads
 in the past 50 years, according to the Washington, D.C.-based Death 
Penalty Information Center.WHAT HAS CAUSED THE LETHAL DRUG SCARCITY?Under Idaho’s bill, firing squads would be used only if executioners can’t obtain the drugs required for lethal injections.As
 lethal injection became the primary execution method in the 2000s, drug
 companies began barring use of their drugs, saying they were meant to 
save lives, not take them.States have found it difficult to 
obtain the cocktail of drugs they long relied on, such as sodium 
thiopental, pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride. Some have 
switched to more accessible drugs such as pentobarbital or midazolam, 
both of which, critics say, can cause excruciating pain.Other 
states have reauthorized the use of electric chairs and gas chambers — 
or are at least considering doing so. That's where firing squads come 
in.ARE THEY MORE HUMANE?Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor is among those who say firing squads are a more humane method of execution.That
 idea is based on expectations that bullets will strike the heart, 
rupturing it and causing immediate unconsciousness as the inmate quickly
 bleeds to death.“In addition to being near instant, death by shooting may also be comparatively painless,” Sotomayor wrote in a 2017 dissent.Her
 comments came in the case of an Alabama inmate who asked to be executed
 by firing squad. A Supreme Court majority refused to hear his appeal. 
In her dissent, Sotomayor said lethal drugs can mask intense pain by 
paralyzing inmates while they are still sentient.“What cruel irony that the method that appears most humane may turn out to be our most cruel experiment yet,” she wrote.BUT IS DEATH BY FIRING SQUAD REALLY PAINLESS?In
 a 2019 federal case, prosecutors submitted statements from 
anesthesiologist Joseph Antognini, who said painless deaths by firing 
squads are not guaranteed.Inmates could remain conscious for up 
to 10 seconds after being shot depending on where bullets strike, 
Antognini said, and those seconds could be “severely painful, especially
 related to shattering of bone and damage to the spinal cord.”Others
 note that killings by firing squad are visibly violent and bloody 
compared with lethal injections, potentially traumatizing victims' 
relatives and other witnesses as well as executioners and staffers who 
clean up afterward.ARE FIRING SQUADS MORE RELIABLE?If reliability means the condemned are more likely to die as intended, then one could make that argument.An
 Amherst College political science and law professor, Austin Sarat, 
studied 8,776 executions in the U.S. between 1890 and 2010 and found 
that 276 of them were botched, or 3.15%.The executions that went wrong included 7.12% of all <a href="https://apnews.com/article/capital-punishment-18a24913cdf8ab8bae1cb03e329365e0">lethal injections</a> — in one notorious 2014 case in Oklahoma, <a href="https://apnews.com/article/executions-oklahoma-00a761ac0ea241a4b89f386bfa841d38">Clayton Locket writhed and clenched his teeth</a> after midazolam was administered — as well as 3.12% of hangings and 1.92% of electrocutions.By
 contrast, not a single one of the 34 firing squad executions was found 
to have been botched, according to Sarat, who has called for an end to 
capital punishment.The Death Penalty Information Center, however,
 has identified at least one firing squad execution that reportedly went
 awry: In 1879, in Utah territory, riflemen missed Wallace Wilkerson’s 
heart and it took 27 minutes for him to die.WERE FIRING SQUADS EVER IN WIDE USE?Firing
 squads have never been a predominant method of carrying out civilian 
death sentences and are more closely associated with the military, 
including the execution of Civil War deserters.From colonial days through 2002, <a href="https://apnews.com/article/4f0fdc45151e38043b064a5d40192936">more than 15,000 people</a>
 were put to death, according to data compiled by death penalty 
researchers M. Watt Espy and John Ortiz Smykla. Just 143 died by firing 
squad, compared with 9,322 by hanging and 4,426 by electrocution.HAS THE SUPREME COURT WEIGHED IN?High
 court rulings have required inmates who oppose an existing execution 
method to offer an alternative. They must prove both that the 
alternative is “significantly” less painful and that the infrastructure 
exists to implement the alternative method.That has led to the spectacle of inmate attorneys bringing multiple cases in which they argue the merits of firing squads.In
 2019, the Supreme Court ruled in Bucklew v. Precythe that some pain 
does not automatically mean a method of execution constitutes “cruel and
 unusual" punishment, which is prohibited by the Eighth Amendment.The
 Constitution "does not guarantee a prisoner a painless death — 
something that, of course, isn’t guaranteed to many people,” Justice 
Neil Gorsuch wrote for the 5-4 majority.Key factors in deciding 
whether a method is “cruel and unusual” include whether it adds extra 
pain “beyond what’s needed to effectuate a death sentence,” Gorsuch 
said.

Why executions by firing squad may be coming back in the US