A South Carolina death row inmate, Freddie Eugene Owens, will be given the choice of lethal injection, electrocution, or a firing squad for his scheduled execution on September 20—the state’s first in 13 years.
Owens, 46, was convicted of the 1997 murder of store clerk Irene Graves during a series of Halloween night robberies in Greenville. The South Carolina Department of Corrections announced that Owens has 14 days to choose his method of execution; if he does not decide, the state will proceed with the electric chair, according to the New York Post.
South Carolina recently added the firing squad as an execution option, which some supporters, including death penalty opponents, argue is a more humane method.
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Owens, scheduled for execution on September 20, has been sentenced to death three times following unsuccessful appeals. After his 1999 conviction for murder, armed robbery, and criminal conspiracy, Owens also killed his cellmate while in the Greenville County Jail.
Owens detailed to investigators how he brutally killed his cellmate by stabbing him, burning his eyes, choking, and stomping him.
Ahead of his September 20 execution, the director of the Broad River Correctional Institute has five days to confirm that all three execution methods—lethal injection, electrocution, and firing squad—are available.
This includes ensuring the lethal injection drug is stable and properly mixed, in line with a 2023 state law that keeps drug suppliers’ identities confidential, as ruled by the South Carolina Supreme Court.
South Carolina, once a leading state for executions, has faced difficulties obtaining lethal drugs since its last execution in 2011. However, the state Supreme Court cleared the path for resuming executions in July.
Currently, 32 inmates are on death row in South Carolina.
“The lack of transparency about the source of the execution drugs, how they were obtained, and whether (they) can bring about as painless a death as possible is still of grave concern to the lawyers that represent persons on death row,” attorney John Blume told the Associated Press on Friday.
Owens, who changed his name to Khalil Divine Black Sun Allah in 2015, has the option to request clemency from Republican Governor Henry McMaster, seeking to have his death sentence commuted to life without parole.
However, reports indicate that no South Carolina governor has granted clemency in the modern era of the death penalty.
