Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan to be executed publicly: Last such execution in US took place over 90 years ago and 20,000 people gathered to witness it

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on Thursday (October 8) said that Nidal Malik Hasan, the convict in the Fort Hood shooting, will be publicly executed. Nidal Hasan is convicted of killing 13 people in the 2009 mass shooting, and is set to be executed by a US Army firing squad at Fort Hood in Texas, on December 3. A defense department official confirmed that the execution will be livestreamed.

Speaking to the conservative outlet Real America's Voice, Hegseth said Hasan is "gonna get a firing squad of soldiers. As it should be." He added: "We'll make sure that people are able to watch it. That it's public. Because people need to understand that there's serious consequences for these types of things."

The Fort Hood shooting

Nidal Hasan, a former US Army psychiatrist, had carried out a mass shooting at the Fort Hood army base in Texas nearly 17 years ago, on November 5, 2009. Around 1:30 pm that day, Hasan entered the Soldier Readiness Processing Center, where soldiers were preparing for deployment.

The shooting left 13 people dead and more than 30 injured, making it the deadliest mass shooting ever at a US military installation. Witnesses reported that Hasan shouted "Allahu Akbar" before he opened fire. The attack ended when law enforcement officers shot and incapacitated Hasan, who was left paralyzed from the waist down.

In August 2013, a military court convicted Hasan of 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted premeditated murder. Days later, the panel unanimously sentenced him to death. He was also dismissed from military service, with his pay and allowances forfeited.

Last public execution in US

If it goes ahead, the public execution of Hasan would be the first in modern US history. The last state-sanctioned public execution in the US took place over 90 years ago in Owensboro, Kentucky. In August 1936, roughly 20,000 people had gathered to witness the hanging of Rainey Bethea, a young black man convicted of raping an elderly white woman.

When was firing squad used previously?

The last documented use of a US military firing squad was in November 1945, when Pvt. Eddie Slovik was given the punishment for desertion during World War 2. Hasan's execution would also be the first by the military justice system since 1961.

Only five states in the US allow for firing squads: Idaho, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Utah. Public executions are common in a few countries, such as Iran, North Korea, and Afghanistan, which is governed by the Taliban.