Policeman's killer to be executed by firing squad in South Carolina

A man convicted of the 2004 murder of an off-duty police officer is to be put to death by firing squad Friday in South Carolina, the second such execution in the US state this year.

Mikal Mahdi, 42, is to be executed at 6:00 pm (2200 GMT) at a prison in state capital Columbia for the murder of James Myers.

Myers, a 56-year-old police captain, was shot nine times after he found Mahdi hiding in a shed on his property. His body was then set on fire.

Mahdi also pleaded guilty to murdering a convenience store clerk three days before he killed Myers.

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South Carolina gives Death Row inmates a choice between lethal injection, the electric chair or the firing squad. Mahdi chose the firing squad.

The first execution by firing squad in the United States in 15 years was carried out in South Carolina on March 7, when a man convicted of murdering his ex-girlfriend's parents was put to death.

A three-person squad of Department of Corrections volunteers opens fire on the condemned man, who is restrained in a chair with a hood over his head 15 feet (five meters) away.

Mahdi has requested clemency from Governor Henry McMaster but South Carolina's Republican chief executive has not granted any previous clemency petitions.

"Mr. Mahdi's life is a tragic story of a child abandoned at every step," his lawyers said in a statement.

When Mahdi was four years old his mother fled her abusive husband and the boy was raised by his volatile mentally ill father, they said.

"Between the ages of 14 and 21, Mikal spent over 80 percent of his life in prison and lived through 8,000 hours in solitary confinement," his lawyers said.

"Now 42, Mikal is deeply remorseful and a dramatically different person from the confused, angry, and abused youth who committed the capital crimes."

There have been 11 executions in the United States so far this year. There were 25 last year.

The vast majority of US executions since the Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976 have been performed using lethal injection.

Alabama has carried out four executions using nitrogen gas, which has been denounced by United Nations experts as cruel and inhumane.

The death penalty has been abolished in 23 of the 50 US states, while three others -- California, Oregon and Pennsylvania -- have moratoriums in place.

President Donald Trump is a proponent of capital punishment and on his first day in office called for an expansion of its use "for the vilest crimes."

Attorney General Pam Bondi announced last week that federal prosecutors would seek the death penalty for Luigi Mangione, charged with the high-profile December 4 murder in New York of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.