Rules volunteers must follow to shoot eight death row inmates in US state

One state in America has become the first to adopt a controversial execution method as its primary form of capital punishment, but if you want to volunteer, there are some rules you’ll need to follow.

From 1 July 2026, the firing squad has been Idaho's default method of execution, despite sceptics arguing that it’s more brutal than the lethal injection.

This means that Idaho will deploy shooters, just like Mississippi, Oklahoma, Utah and South Carolina.

However, while it joins other Southern States in permitting death by firing squad as the first case for death penalties, there’s one major difference in its law.

Its use of volunteer shooters.

That’s right, you could become a certified firing squad member on a temporary basis which allows you to kill eight inmates.

But it’s not as simple as that, and if you’re doing it just to kill someone, there’s a good chance you won’t be accepted into the program.

Idaho has now made it the primary form of death for prisoners (Getty Stock Images)

If you do, however, get chosen, there’s something you’ll need to know first.

It’s that you have to be anonymous to everyone except two people.

According to the Guardian, the identities of the three volunteer shooters are known only to the state prisons director and deputy.

But what is reported of their identities, is that one of them is female, per the outlet.

When it comes to death by lethal injection, it hasn’t been a smooth ride either.

The most recent attempt, in February 2024, ended in failure when the execution team was unable to find a usable vein after eight attempts on death row's longest-serving inmate, Thomas Creech.

Being poked for veins eight times wouldn’t have been pain-free.

Thus, a more reliable service was deployed – despite questions surrounding its ethics.

Volunteers are anonymous (Getty Stock Images)

For exe­cu­tion by fir­ing squad, Death Penalty Info states prisoners are bound to a chair with leather straps across his waist and head, with sand­bags surrounding them to absorb blood.

A black hood is also placed over the pris­on­er’s head while a doctor checks the location of the pris­on­er’s heart with a stetho­scope and then pins a cir­cu­lar white cloth tar­get over it as a target for the shooters.

From there, 20 feet away, the shooters will fire their single shots.

But there are ways it can fail, as the website states: “The per­son shot los­es con­scious­ness when shock caus­es a fall in the sup­ply of blood to the brain. If the shoot­ers miss the heart, by acci­dent or inten­tion, the pris­on­er bleeds to death slow­ly.”

Unfortunately, this has happened in South Carolina, when inmate

A prisoner was shot by only two of the bullets, neither piercing his heart.

UNILAD previously contacted the Idaho Department of Corrections for comment.