By Ted Clifford
The State
COLUMBIA, S.C. — A Sumter man whose killing spree left three dead has chosen to be executed by firing squad.
Stephen Bryant who shot and killed his victims with a stolen gun, robbed their homes and taunted police with a message scrawled in one victim’s blood will be executed on Nov. 14 . He will be the third person executed by firing squad in South Carolina.
Bryant chose to die by firing squad despite concerns that the execution of Mikal Mahdi, the last person to choose the firing squad, was botched when the bullets did not directly hit his heart.
Mahdi yelled in pain when he was shot and a subsequent autopsy found only two bullet entry wounds. South Carolina’s firing squad protocol calls for three executioners all using loaded rifles.
Lawyers for other death row inmates argued in court that the executions “intended to miss” Mahdi, who executed an Orangeburg police officer in an ambush-style attack on the officer’s own property.
The South Carolina Department of Corrections has denied anything went wrong. They have claimed that all three rifles were fired and two bullets must have entered Mahdi’s body at the same point.
South Carolina state law requires death row inmates to select how they will be executed. They must choose between lethal injection, firing squad or the electric chair, which is considered the default option.
Bryant, 44, pleaded guilty and was sentenced to death in 2004 for the murder of Willard Tietjen. Bryant also pleaded guilty to the murders of Cliff Gainey and Christopher Burgess.
Bryant’s lawyers have said that he suffered from fetal alcohol syndrome resulting in a lower than average IQ and poor impulse control. Bryant was diagnosed with PTSD as a result of childhood sexual abuse, which his attorneys argued led him to perceive some of the men he killed as threats.
If the sentence is carried out, Bryant will be the seventh person executed since South Carolina resumed executions in Sept. 2024 following a 13 year-long pause. Four men have chosen to die by lethal injection.
South Carolina’s methods of executions have drawn controversy. The state carries out the lethal injection using a single drug, pentobarbital. However, the federal government under the Biden administration announced they would stop using pentobarbital in executions because of the high risk of pulmonary embolism, a condition where the lungs fill with fluid.
Some experts and lawyers for men on death row have argued that this causes condemned men to feel like they are drowning, causing unnecessary pain and suffering.
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