House Bill 186 "amends existing law to provide for execution by firing squad and to provide for certain requirements prior to an execution."
Bryan Kohberger could find himself standing in front of a firing squad if convicted of murder and sentenced to death after the passage of a new bill in Idaho.
House bill 186 passed in the House by a vote of 50-15 and then went to the Senate where it passed by a vote of 24-11, giving the bill a veto-proof majority as it headed to the desk of Gov. Brad Little.
The bill "amends existing law to provide for execution by firing squad and to provide for certain requirements prior to an execution."
Individuals who are sentenced to death in Idaho are currently executed by way of lethal injection.
This new bill allows for death by firing squad should the state not be able to obtain the drugs required for a lethal injection.
That happened last month in Idaho, when the scheduled execution of Gerald Ross Pizzuto Jr. had to be delayed because the state did not have the drugs required and there was no law on the books about an alternative method for executing those on death row.
Idaho now joins South Carolina, Mississippi, Oklahoma and Utah to have death by firing squad as a form of execution.
The state is also where one of the country's most infamous alleged criminals is set to go on trial
Kohberger is accused of killing four University of Idaho students as they lay in their beds after a night of partying with friends. He has not entered a plea, but has been assigned a public defender who is qualified to handle death penalty cases.
LORI VALLOW DAYBELL MOTION TO DISMISS DEATH PENALTY
Meanwhile. another high-profile defendant learned that she will not be sentenced to death if convicted in her case.
Lori Vallow Daybell, the mother accused of killing her two children, filed a motion to dismiss the death penalty in her case earlier this month.
The judge overseeing those proceedings granted that motion on Tuesday during a bench hearing for reasons that are unclear because the court minutes are being kept under seal.
Vallow Daybell had also filed a motion to declare the death penalty unconstitutional as well, but the court declared that motion moot having already granted her motion to dismiss.
The judge in the case entered a not guilty plea on Vallow Daybell's behalf after she refused to respond to the charges.
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