A firing squad is set to kill a South Carolina inmate. Friday's execution will be the second time in the past five weeks the state will have carried out an execution using that method, which previously has been associated with political terror or military justice.

A firing squad on Friday executed a South Carolina man who killed an off-duty police officer, the second time the rare execution method has been used by the state in the past five weeks. Mikal Mahdi gave no final statement and did not look to his right toward the nine witnesses in the room behind bulletproof glass and bars once the curtain opened.