Ronnie Lee Gardner Executed By Firing Squad

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AP

Utah executed convicted killer Ronnie Lee Gardner after midnight this morning by firing squad.

He becomes just the third person in the last 33 years to be executed by being shot and likely one of the last. Utah has eliminated the firing squad (Gardner, convicted before the legal change, was grandfathered in) and it only remains legal as a means of execution in Oklahoma — even then, only as a backup.

“It was over pretty quickly,” Cheryl Worsley, a radio reporter, told CNN. “It was cleaner than I expected. It was fast. But he moved. He moved a little bit, and to some degree that bothers me.”

Gardner’s attorney said he chose the method of execution because it was “more humane” than a lethal injection. Read more about the firing squad here.