South Carolina’s first execution in more than 13 years set for next month

South Carolina will carry out its first execution in more than 13 years next month following struggles to obtain lethal injection drugs.

Freddie Eugene Owens, 46, is scheduled to be executed on Sept. 20 for the 1997 killing of store clerk Irene Graves during a string of robberies in Greenville. Owens also killed his cellmate at the Greenville County Jail after his conviction in 1999, but before his sentencing.

Once one of the busiest states for executions, South Carolina had trouble in recent years obtaining lethal injection drugs because of pharmaceutical companies’ concerns that they would have to disclose that they had sold the drugs to state officials, according to The Associated Press.

The state legislature has since passed a shield law allowing officials to keep lethal injection drug suppliers private.

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In July, the state Supreme Court cleared the way to allow the state to resume executions.

Owens is expected to have the choice of being executed by lethal injection, electrocution or the new option of a firing squad. The last U.S. execution to be carried out by a firing squad was done in Utah in 2010, according to the nonprofit Death Penalty Information Center.

The prison’s director has five days to confirm that all three execution methods will be available for Owens to choose from. Owens’ lawyers must also be provided proof that the lethal injection drug is stable and correctly mixed, according to the high court’s 2023 interpretation of the state’s secrecy law on executions that helped clear the way for South Carolina to again carry out the death penalty.

Owens will then have about a week to notify the state which execution method he wants to use. If he does not make a decision, the state will use the electric chair by default.

A lawyer for Owens said the defense is waiting for prison officials to submit a sworn statement next week about the purity, potency and quality of the lethal injection drug under the terms of the state’s new shield law and will await a determination on whether it is acceptable to both the state and federal courts.

“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.

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This undated photo provided by the South Carolina Department of Corrections shows the state’s death chamber in Columbia, South Carolina. (South Carolina Department of Corrections via AP, File)

Justices said there would be a swift ruling if an inmate challenged the details in the disclosure.

South Carolina previously used a mixture of three drugs, but will now use one drug, the sedative pentobarbital, for lethal injections in a protocol similar to that of the federal government.

The state’s last execution was carried out in May 2011. While the state did seek to pause executions, its supply of lethal injection drugs expired and companies refused to sell the state more if the transaction was made public.

Executions may now resume after a decade of debate in the legislature, including adding the firing squad method and later passing a shield law.

South Carolina has executed 43 inmates since the death penalty was restarted in the U.S. in 1976. Only nine states have put more inmates to death.

The state’s death row population has been reduced since the unintentional pause on executions. The state had 63 condemned inmates in early 2011 but now only has 32. About 20 inmates have been removed from death row and received different prison sentences after successful appeals, while others have died of natural causes.

South Carolina will carry out its first execution in more than 13 years next month. (AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki, File)

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In addition to Owens, at least three other inmates have exhausted their regular appeals and a few more are nearing their last appeals.

The recent state Supreme Court ruling that reopened the door for executions found that the state shield law was legal and that both the electric chair and firing squad were not cruel punishments.

The South Carolina General Assembly authorized the state to create a firing squad in 2021 to offer inmates a choice between that method and the electric chair.

Owens has been sentenced to death three separate times during his appeals.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.