Michael Archuleta, 49, who was convicted of beating a man with a tire jack and tire iron, requested that his death sentence be carried out by firing squad. Judge Donald Eyre signed the death warrant for Archuleta and honored the inmate’s request.
Since 1976 when the death penalty was reinstated in Utah, there have only been three people to choose to be executed by a firing squad. The last one was Ronnie Lee Gardner back in June 2010. The court in Utah does not have to honor a death row inmate’s preferred manner of execution. However, the state prosecutors in the case did not object. The state did reserve the right to ask for lethal injection at some point in the future.
Archuleta was convicted in 1988. He beat his victim with a tire jack and then punctured the man’s liver with a tire iron by shoving it inside the man’s body. The victim, Gordon Ray Church, was picked up at a Cedar City convenience store by Archuleta and his accomplice, Lance Wood. Church was taken to a secluded area and some sort of sexual act took place. Church was bound and put in the trunk. The two men then drove about sixty miles away.
Church was tortured, as the men tried to electrocute him by attaching jumper cables to his testicles. Eventually, they hit him with a tire jack and forced the tire iron up his rectum. Tire chains were wrapped around Church’s neck and were still there when his body was found. The two men stole Church’s watch and wallet.
According to Utah state law, an execution by firing squad is carried out with five marksmen. Each man has a .30 caliber rifle. One of the rifles will have a blank round, while the other four will have real bullets. The firing squad fires from about 25 feet at the inmate, who is blindfolded and strapped to a chair. There is a target that is pinned to the convicted man’s chest.
