SALT LAKE CITY (AP) ? Randy Gardner still struggles four years later to talk about seeing his brother's bullet-ridden body at the mortuary after he was executed.
Ronnie Lee Gardner was the last person to die by firing squad in Utah ? a method state lawmakers voted this week to reinstate, illustrating frustrations across the U.S. over bungled executions and shortages of lethal-injection drugs.
Randy Gardner made it clear Wednesday he did not condone what his brother did ? first killing a bartender and later shooting a lawyer to death and wounding a bailiff during a courthouse escape attempt.
But he said the firing squad is brutal.
"When you take somebody and you tie them to a chair, put a hood over their head, and you shoot them from 25 feet with four rifles pointed at their heart, that's pretty barbaric."
Brother of man executed by Utah firing squad calls it brutal