Wikipedia:Today's featured article/March 10, 2015

Ronnie Lee Gardner (1961–2010) was an American felon who received the death penalty for murder in 1985 and was executed by a firing squad by the state of Utah. In 1984 he killed a bartender during a robbery in Salt Lake City, and the next year killed an attorney in an unsuccessful escape attempt. He was sentenced to life imprisonment for the first murder and received the death penalty for the second. In a series of appeals, defense attorneys presented mitigating evidence of the troubled upbringing of Gardner, who had spent nearly his entire adult life in incarceration. His legal team took the case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which declined to intervene. His execution at Utah State Prison, the first to be carried out by firing squad in the U.S. in 14 years, became a focus of media attention in June 2010. Gardner stated that he sought this method of execution because of his Mormon background. On the day before his execution, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints released a statement clarifying its position on the issue of blood atonement of individuals. The case also attracted debate over capital punishment and whether Gardner's difficult childhood had destined him for a life of violence.

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