Idaho Lawmakers Pass Firing Squad Execution Legislation

Nine people are currently on death row in Idaho.

An armed California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) officer escorts a condemned inmate at San Quentin State Prison's death row in San Quentin, California on Aug. 15, 2016. Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Lawmakers in Idaho passed new legislation on Wednesday that, if signed into law, could make death by firing squad the state’s primary method of execution for inmates on death row.

House Bill 37 passed the state’s Senate in a 28–7 vote roughly a month after the House voted 58–11 to pass it. It will take effect on July 1, 2026, if it is signed by Gov. Brad Little.

Idaho is among five states—including Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Utah—that allow the use of firing squads in certain circumstances, though the method has rarely been used in recent history.

In Idaho, such executions have been allowed as a backup method since 2023 but only if lethal injection drugs cannot be obtained by authorities, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

Along with amending Idaho’s existing law on methods of execution, the legislation passed by lawmakers this week directs the Idaho Department of Correction director to develop procedures for firing squad executions.

The measure notes that if a court “holds that firing squad is unconstitutional, on its face or as applied, or otherwise determines that lethal injection is a constitutionally required method of execution, the method of execution shall be lethal injection.”

Nine people are currently on death row in Idaho, according to the Idaho Department of Correction. They have been convicted of first-degree murder and crimes including rape and arson.

Rep. Doug Ricks (R-Rexburg), the sponsor of House Bill 37, said the legislation was prompted by Idaho’s botched attempt last year to execute Thomas Eugene Creech, the state’s longest-serving death row inmate, who has been convicted of five murders across three states and is suspected of carrying out several more.

Execution team members tried to find a suitable vein to deliver the lethal drug to Creech in eight locations in his arms and legs in February but were unable to do so.

Ricks suggested shooting someone was more effective and humane compared to other execution methods and said the state could use a machine or “electronic triggering methods” therefore bypassing the need for human volunteers to pull the triggers.

‘Anything but Humane’

“One thing about this method, it’s pretty sure,” Ricks said during a hearing on the bill last month. “It’s not going to be something that gets done part way,” Ricks said.

Republican Sen. Daniel Foreman, a retired police officer and former Air Force veteran, was the only Republican to oppose the bill on Wednesday.

The lawmaker said he has seen shooting deaths, and that they are “anything but humane.”

“The consequences of a botched firing execution are more graphic, more mentally, psychologically devastating” than other botched execution methods, Foreman said.

A firing squad execution chamber at the Utah State Prison in Draper on June 18, 2010. Trent Nelson/AP

Senate Minority Leader Melissa Wintrow agreed, calling firing squads “barbaric” and saying it would create “bad optics” for the state.

South Carolina is preparing to execute 67-year-old convicted murderer Brad Sigmon by firing squad on Friday after he declined to die by lethal injection or the electric chair.

Sigmon was convicted in the 2001 baseball bat killings of his ex-girlfriend’s parents at their home in Greenville County.

His execution will be the first to be conducted by a firing squad in the United States in 15 years. In total, just three inmates have been executed by firing squad since 1976; all were in Utah, with the last one taking place in 2010.

The Federal Defender Services of Idaho could not be reached for comment.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.