Firing Squad ‘Botches’ Execution Of Death Row Inmate, Suffered Excruciating Pain Longer Than Intended

A South Carolina firing squad ‘botched’ the execution of a man convicted of killing a police officer in 2004.

Mikal Mahdi, 42, was executed by a three-person firing squad last month.

According to NPR, an autopsy revealed two wounds on his chest instead of three, and none of the bullets hit his heart directly.

“Instead, the wounds caused damage to his liver and other internal organs, and allowed his heart to keep beating. Pathologists say the injuries likely caused the prisoner pain and suffering while he was still conscious,” NPR stated.

South Carolina firing squad ‘botched’ execution of cop killer Mikal Mahdi as bullets missed heart, left him alive ‘longer than was intended’ https://t.co/1ZdgKrERYo pic.twitter.com/YykJuzDPcT

— New York Post (@nypost) May 8, 2025

Per NPR:

“He’s not going to die instantaneously from this,” said Dr. Carl Wigren, a forensic pathologist who reviewed the autopsy documents for NPR. “I think that it took him some time to bleed out.”

On May 8, lawyers for Mahdi notified the South Carolina Supreme Court that the execution was “botched.” They cited the state’s autopsy and a forensic report that Mahdi’s lawyers commissioned from another pathologist, Dr. Jonathan Arden.

“Mr. Mahdi did experience excruciating conscious pain and suffering for about 30 to 60 seconds after he was shot,” Arden wrote in his analysis of the state autopsy.

The constitution in South Carolina, like the U.S. Constitution, bans cruel or unusual punishment. In 2021, the state passed a law allowing prisoners to choose the firing squad as a method of execution, in addition to the electric chair and lethal injection. Prisoners challenged the law in court.

In 2024, the South Carolina Supreme Court ruled that all three methods were legal, writing that the firing squad was not cruel because a prisoner would not suffer longer than 15 seconds.

“In July 2004, Mahdi went on a multi-state crime spree — committing carjacking, firearm robbery, and three murders, including that of 56-year-old off-duty police officer James Myers, who was shot at least eight times before his body was burned,” the New York Post noted.

WATCH:

BULLETS MISSED THE HEART — SOUTH CAROLINA EXECUTION LABELED ‘BOTCHED’

A South Carolina firing squad failed to strike the heart of convicted cop killer Mikal Mahdi, leaving him conscious for up to 80 seconds in what experts are calling a botched execution.

Mikal Mahdi was… https://t.co/uNYsbcAkGm pic.twitter.com/mA9EGqmRLV

— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) May 9, 2025

From the New York Post:

In March, the death row inmate chose execution by firing squad, just five weeks after the state carried out its first death by bullets.

A doctor noted in the comments section on the state autopsy that “it is believed that” two bullets went through one wound.

But pathologists who reviewed were skeptical that two bullets went through precisely the same small hole.

“I think the odds of that are pretty minuscule,” Wigren said.

Jeffrey Collins, a reporter for the Associated Press, wrote that he heard Mahdi groan twice about 45 seconds after shots. He continued to breathe for another 80 seconds before he appeared to take a final gasp, Collins wrote.

“Both the forensic medical evidence and the reported eyewitness observations of the execution corroborate that Mr. Mahdi was alive and reacting longer than was intended or expected,” Arden concluded in his report.

Do you feel bad for him?

What’s your opinion?