COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — The South Carolina Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected a request for more information on the firing squad from an inmate set to die next month over concerns about whether a man executed by the method last month suffered a lingering death.
The justices unanimously ruled that attorneys for Stephen Stanko did not prove the previous execution was botched even though lawyers argued the firing squad nearly missed the inmate's heart and prolonged his death. They also said all three bulleted fired may not have hit the prisoner's body.
Stanko, 57, is scheduled to die June 13. He has been sentenced to death twice in the state for two separate murders — one a friend and one his girlfriend as he raped her daughter.
Stanko has until Friday to decide if he wants to die by firing squad, lethal injection or the electric chair.
Potential firing squad problems
Stanko's execution is the first scheduled in South Carolina since Mikal Mahdi was put to death by firing squad on April 11.
Mahdi’s lawyers released autopsy results that show the shots that killed him barely hit his heart and suggested he was in agonizing pain for three or four times longer than experts say he would have been if his heart had been hit directly.
Stanko’s lawyers asked the South Carolina Supreme Court to require prison officials to release more information about the firing squad and lethal injection, saying he was leaning toward the firing squad until the possible problems with Mahdi’s execution surfaced.
Mahdi was the second inmate to die in South Carolina by firing squad.
Autopsy issues
The only photo of Mahdi taken at his autopsy shows two apparent chest wounds. Officials said all three bullets fired by the three volunteer prison employees hit Mahdi, with two going through the same hole.
During the state’s first firing squad death, the autopsy found that Brad Sigmon’s heart had been destroyed. Just one of the four chambers of Mahdi’s heart was perforated, which likely meant he didn’t die in the 15 seconds experts predicted he would have if the squad’s aim was true, according to his lawyers.
Witnesses said Mahdi, who had a hood over his head, groaned 45 seconds after he was shot.
Lawyers for Stanko said Mahdi's autopsy lacked X-rays, an examination of his clothing or other testing typically done to allow the results — like where a bullet tracked — to be independently verified.
South Carolina Supreme Court responds
But the state Supreme Court rejected the request for any reports the prison agency produces to review executions, the description of the training the firing squad conducts and the steps taken when an X-ray is done before the shooting to locate the heart.
The justices also refused to require prison officials to say if the same members of the firing squad and target placement team used for Mahdi would work on Stanko's execution.
"Appellant has made no showing that Mahdi’s execution was 'botched' or that protocols were not followed such that Appellant needs further information to make an informed election of the method of his execution," the justices wrote.
The crimes
Stanko is being executed for killing his 74-year-old friend Henry Turner. Stanko went to Turner’s home in April 2006 after lying about his father dying and then shot Turner twice while using a pillow as a silencer, authorities said.
Stanko stole Turner’s truck, cleaned out his bank account and then spent the next few days in Augusta, Georgia, where he told people in town for the Masters golf tournament that he owned several Hooters restaurants. He stayed with a woman who took him to church. She then called police once she saw his photo and that he was wanted, police said.
Hours before killing Turner, Stanko beat and strangled his girlfriend in her home and raped her daughter before slashing the teen’s throat. The daughter survived and testified against him at one of his trials.
“Stephen Stanko is just plain evil. He has in his core down deep inside something that makes him evil. He’s a bad man, he knows it, and he likes it. He doesn’t turn away from it. He will hide it. He’s very, very, very good at hiding it, but you cannot equate evil with insanity,” then-prosecutor Greg Hembree said in his closing statement at one of Stanko’s trials.
Hembree later became a state senator and was the chief sponsor of the 2021 law allowing South Carolina to use a firing squad.
Jeffrey Collins, The Associated Press
