Public executions in USA: What does Fort Hood firing squad execution mean? When will Pentagon live stream take place?

USA military plans to livestream the December 3 execution by firing squad of Nidal Hasan, the former Army psychiatrist convicted of killing 13 people in the 2009 Fort Hood shooting. If carried out as planned, death penalty experts said it would mark the first known broadcast or livestream of a lawful execution.

The Pentagon said on Thursday that it would livestream the firing squad execution of the man who killed 13 people at the Fort Hood military base in 2009, raising questions about the legality of the unprecedented announcement.

Death by Firing Squad in US


Yes. The US Supreme Court said in a unanimous 1879 decision that execution by firing squad is not "cruel and unusual punishment" prohibited by the Constitution. The justices last year cleared the way for South Carolina to carry out its first execution by firing squad in decades.

Five states currently allow executions by firing squad: Idaho, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Utah. The Trump administration earlier this year said it would allow execution by firing squad in the federal prison system.

The US Army also once regularly carried out executions by firing squad of US soldiers found guilty of desertion or other offenses. Hundreds of US soldiers were sentenced to death during the Civil War from 1861 to 1865.

Under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, the president is the only person who can approve a death sentence for a member of the US armed services. President Donald Trump on October 5 signed off on the Pentagon's plan to execute the Fort Hood gunman, Nidal Hasan, a former Army psychiatrist.

Public Executions Live Streaming

Executions in the US were once public spectacles, but in the last century have been carried out in correctional facilities away from the public eye. In 1936, a man convicted of rape was hanged in front of thousands in Owensboro, Kentucky, while the following year, hundreds watched a public hanging in Missouri.

Public executions have become rare worldwide, with most countries that retain the death penalty carrying out executions away from public view. According to Amnesty International, public executions recorded in recent years have largely been concentrated in Iran and Taliban-run Afghanistan.

The execution would also be notable in the United States. Public executions largely disappeared during the 20th century, and death penalty experts cited by Reuters said the last legally sanctioned public execution took place in 1936.

Hasan's execution would be the first carried out by firing squad by the U.S. military since the 1945 execution of Eddie Slovik, who was convicted of desertion during World War Two.

A US law prohibits the recording or broadcasting of executions in the federal prison system. But military regulations have not applied that same prohibition to military executions. Hasan was convicted of premeditated murder by a military jury in 2013, following a court-martial trial.

State laws regulate who can witness executions, generally limiting access to authorized officials, family members, legal counsel, and a handful of media representatives.

Courts have long rejected lawsuits brought by media organizations seeking broader public access to executions.

In 2021, a judge denied a request by an internet company to livestream the lethal injection execution of Timothy McVeigh, an anti-government militant who bombed a federal building in Oklahoma City in 1995, killing 168 people. The Justice Department did provide a restricted, closed-circuit television broadcast exclusively for survivors of the bombing and victims' families.