SALT LAKE CITY (ABC4) — The Utah Department of Corrections is now officially preparing for the firing squad execution of Ralph Leroy Menzies, the 67-year-old inmate sentenced to death row for the kidnapping and murder of Maurine Hunsaker in 1988.
Menzies will be the second person killed by firing squad in the United States this year after Brad Sigmon was executed by a South Carolina firing squad in March. Before that, Ronnie Lee Gardner, a Salt Lake City murder convict, was executed in Utah by firing squad in 2010.
It’s a method of execution that one witness reporter described as “violent and sudden.” However, Jared Garcia, Executive Director at the Utah Department of Corrections, believes his department is ready to carry it out with professionalism and respect…