Capital punishment in South Carolina

Capital punishment is a legal penalty in the U.S. state of South Carolina. Between 1718 and 2021, more than 680 people have been executed in South Carolina.^[1] Since a nationwide capital punishment ban was overturned in 1976, South Carolina has executed 43 people.^[2]

The state executed 43 people between 1985 and 2011, after which no one was executed for over a decade because pharmaceutical companies were not selling the drugs for lethal injections that were legalised as the primary form of execution in 1995, and the existing inmates were able to appeal their sentences. Under the passage of Act 43 of 2021, executions are expected to resume with the electric chair as the primary form of execution.^[3]

Legal process[]

When the prosecution seeks the death penalty, sentence is not passed by the judge. The sentence is decided by the jury and must be unanimous.

In case of a hung jury during the penalty phase of the trial, a life sentence is issued, even if a single juror opposed death (there is no retrial).^[4]

The governor has the power of clemency with respect to death sentences.^[5]

The methods of execution are lethal injection, electrocution, and firing squad.^[6][7]

On January 30, 2019, South Carolina's Senate voted 26–13 in favor of a revived proposal to bring back the electric chair and add firing squads to its execution options.^[8][9] On May 14, 2021, South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster signed a bill into law which brought back the electric chair as the default method of execution (in the event lethal injection was unavailable) and added the firing squad to the list of execution options. This made South Carolina the first state to use a method other than lethal injection as its primary execution method since 2009, when Nebraska switched over to that method, also from electrocution. South Carolina has not performed executions in over a decade, and its lethal injection drugs expired in 2013. Pharmaceutical companies have since refused to sell drugs for lethal injection.^[10][11][12] The law is Act 43 of 2021.

Capital crimes[]

Murder can be punished by death if the crime involved certain aggravating factors, as listed under Section 16-3-655, Title 16, Chapter 3, Section 655, of the South Carolina Code of Laws. South Carolina provides for the death penalty for criminal sexual conduct with a minor if the offender was a repeat offender having previously been convicted of, pled guilty or nolo contendere to, or adjudicated delinquent for first degree criminal sexual conduct with a minor who is less than eleven years of age or a federal or out-of-state offense that would constitute first degree criminal sexual conduct with a minor who is less than eleven years of age had it been committed in South Carolina ^[4]

See also[]

• List of people executed in South Carolina
• List of death row inmates in South Carolina
• Crime in South Carolina

References[]