Triple murderer becomes third person to die by rare execution method recently used for first time in 15 years
A convicted triple murderer is the third person this year to face execution by firing squad in the US after a gap of around 15 years in its use as a means of carrying out the death penalty.
Stephen Bryant, 44, chose the firing squad rather than a lethal injection or the firing squad after three prison officers volunteered to pull the trigger.
He had spent 21 years behind bars after being found guilty of murdering three people over the course of several days in 2004 and yesterday (14 November) he became the third person South Carolina killed in such a manner.
According to The Independent, his final meal was a seafood stir fry and chocolate cake, and when the time of his execution came he did not give a final statement.
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Instead he was shot by the three prison officers and gave 'a final spasm' just over a minute later, with a doctor then pronouncing him dead at 6.05pm local time.
In October 2004 while on probation for burglary, Bryant killed 36-year-old Clifton Gainey, 35-year-old Christopher Burgess and 62-year-old Willard Tietjen, while he also shot 56-year-old Clinton Brown in the back but the man survived.
Court records indicate that Bryant had convinced Tietjen to let him into his home after claiming his truck had broken down. The convicted killer told police they had spoken for hours before he shot Tietjen nine times.
He then left a message in his victim's blood: "Victem [sic] 4 in 2 weeks. Catch me if u can."
Bo King, a lawyer working on death penalty cases in South Carolina, said in a statement that Bryant had a genetic disorder, had been the victim of abuse by his relatives and his mother's binge drinking 'permanently damaged his body and brain'.
"Mr. Bryant’s impairments left him unable to endure the tormenting memories of his childhood," the lawyer's statement said.
The 44-year-old is the third person in 2025 to be executed by firing squad in South Carolina, and indeed in the US.
Convicted double murderer Brad Sigmon was executed by firing squad in March this year, having opted for the execution method over lethal injection or electric chair and becoming the first person in 15 years to face the method of execution in the US after Ronnie Lee Gardner was put to death in 2010 in Utah.
A witness to Sigmon's execution who had seen 10 previous death row sentences carried out said that he'd found it a 'faster' and 'more violent' method than the other ways, and that nothing he'd seen before prepared him for it.
A month later, fellow death row inmate Mikal Mahdi was also executed by firing squad and his attorneys pointed towards his autopsy report claiming that he had been shot lower down in the body than expected, the bullets missing his heart, and that he had not been pronounced dead until four minutes after he was shot.
The South Carolina Department of Corrections 'strongly refuted' the claims that they had botched the execution, insisting that all three bullets had struck Madhi's heart.
Joe Harker