The Josh Innes Show - Kirk Shooter Could Face Firing Squad

Episode Date: September 17, 2025

Utah is one of two states where firing squad is a possibility execution. I'm intrigued by this. There is some guy in Utah that has been on death row since 1988. How is that possible? If you're on death row for nearly 40 years, are you really on death row? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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in modern history. What is the other, you may ask? Is it South Carolina? Does that sound right? South Carolina is another one that does the firing squad? I'm not sure. But now I'm intrigued. So let's play a couple commercials and let's talk about the firing squad. One of my favorite topics, the firing squad and the death penalty and how people should be killed after they kill somebody.

We'll do that after these words. When I found out my friend got a great deal on a wool coat from winners, I started wondering. Is every fabulous item I see from winners? Like that woman over there with the designer jeans. Are

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The death penalty is intriguing to me because there are obviously two camps in this. On one hand, you'd say, good, don't live. You know, die. You killed someone that's an eye for an eye. then you could argue there is something to be said about rotting in prison, right? Like you have your whole life. Like, it's one thing to live, but to not really live. If you're in prison, are you really living?

You're not on the outside. You're not in the outside world. You don't have any freedom. You're never going to get out of jail, especially with a high-profile murder like this. You're not going to be out of jail. So no matter what, you're going to be in jail. So is there something to be said about just rotting away? The problem is these guys don't really just rot away in prison.

like eventually they kind of get used to it and it becomes their daily life and then they become kind of an out of side out of mind type of person perhaps and you know they just kind of build a normal life inside there now it's not the greatest life ever the food's not very good whatever i mean it's the life that you're going to live though and you live and you learn to accept it i'm sure early on you struggle to accept it but after you've been there a while and you understand that you're not getting out and there's no way you're going to be getting out you just say ah fuck it this is my life and this is my life and this is what I do now. Now, that's not to say, you know, that you may not die in prison. Somebody may beat your ass and kill you in there. But I think at some point these guys get used to it and they accept it. And it's like, this is my life. This is what I have to do. Another camp, and I'm kind of in this one. Because I used to be anti-death penalty, not because I'm some sort of, you know, like, oh my God, we can't do that type of thing. Or not that I'm appalled by the idea of it. But my thought process was, why would you allow someone who took someone's life

to be able to find comfort in prison. Does that make sense? Does it make sense? Like, a lot of these guys go to prison and they find Jesus, for instance, right? Like, these guys go to prison. They have nothing else to do but find God. Like, that's their only hope.

Like, at that point, you have to start believing in God. Early on, you probably don't. You're like, there is no God. I'm in prison. But after a while, you kind of have to start developing a faith and believing in a higher power because if you do that, that gives you hope at least that once your time on earth is through, that you'll be going somewhere else, that you've been forgiven.

You're able to tell yourself that Jesus is forgiven you and you've been saved and maybe you can still go to heaven. Do you want someone who in cold blood murdered somebody to be able to feel that way? Do you want someone to be able to feel like, you know, they have been forgiven for that? Do you want them to feel that pleasure or that joy? And I kind of lean towards no. Like, if I were Charlie Kirk's wife, like I understand that a lot of people say the right things. But if I were a family member of this guy, the last thing I would want is for this guy who blew my husband's head off in front of all these people in Utah.

Like, the last thing I'd want is for him to feel comfort and feel forgiven. I'd want the guy to just be miserable, which who knows if he would anyway. but if he's going to spend the next 30 or 40 years in prison, I don't want it to be some situation where he becomes, you know, like a guy that the guards like, and he's some guy that's like the guy that delivers the library books to everybody else. I know I'm doing a very archaic Shawshanky type breakdown of what prison is, but like I don't want him to develop a life in prison that makes him happy and that he's acceptable, he's accepted, and that he's content with.

Like, I don't want him to do that. And if he's going to die, like, I understand this is inhumane, but like there is a like you're kind of letting the dudes off the hook by killing them and generally speaking it seems like the way these guys die is a fairly humane way outside of like the electric chair which sometimes doesn't take I guess but like lethal injection is lethal injection humane like what do dudes feel like do like okay does lethal injection hurt lethal injection hurt people when it happens like kills them obviously but there are significant Evidence and expert consensus that lethal injection can cause severe pain and suffering, despite once being promoted as a humane alternative to other execution methods. The pain is often hidden by paralytic drugs, which can mask inmate's distress while they remain conscious. No, make them miserable.

Make them die in a painful manner. If you're going to kill somebody, like I get that you're unaliving them, but make their lives, their last moments on earth? Make it miserable. But anyway, let's continue this story. But the decision opens the door for another question. Since Utah allows execution by firing squad or lethal injections, which of the two would likely be used in the event of a conviction and death sentence? Gary said that the issue of the death penalty in any form is a tough one for prosecutors. Quote, I do not take this decision lightly, and it is a decision I've made independently as county attorney based solely on the available evidence and circumstances and nature of the crime.

I talked to officials from both Cox and Trump administrations, and I was not pressured to make a decision. Gray emphasized that the accused is presumed innocent until we, the state, proved to an impartial jury of defendants peers his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. While most executions in the U.S. are carried out by lethal injection, Robinson faces a trial in YouTube. which is one of only two states that has firing squad. The other, of course, aha, it is South Carolina. USA Today is looking at the use of the controversial execution method in the state and the nation and whether Robinson could face a firing squad if convicted of murder and sentenced to death. Oh, here's what you need to know.

Two states have used it. Just five inmates have died by firing squad since 1977, although two of those executions happened this year. We've had two firing squads this year. So that means there were only three firing squad executions of the U.S. from 1977 to 2025. And then two. Trump's America, brother. We got the firing squad going.

Like, to me, that would be, like, I think that I'm in favor of the firing squad. Now, if it were me dying, I don't know that I'd be in favor of it. I don't know how, like, whatever way that I would be. I just want to die in my sleep. Can you guys give me something that'll just put my ass to sleep? And then while I'm asleep, you just shut my ass out, put a pillow over my face, suffocate me. I don't know. but like firing squad I like

because you don't know where it's coming from and then I would let the family shoot him like I understand that like part of it is you get guys who are experts at this and they know exactly how to shoot you where to shoot you to not to end you I want someone who has no idea what they're fucking doing to shoot you

because I know like they'll not hit you in the spots that they need to hit you and you'll just be fucking miserable like that's what I'd like to see in a firing squad situation it's like let the family members of the person who was shot let them

grab a gun and just blow you away if they want that should be like if they don't want to they don't have to but like that should be the first option first order of business here guys first dibs goes to the family you get the opportunity to shoot the guy that shot your dad if you don't want it like I get it that's fine but if you do here you go take him out and then like what kind of gun should be used for that you know like something like a musket I want a firing squad to have a musket I want to go medieval with it give me a musket like where you have to fill it like in the muzzle, you know, and like stuff it all down, like the gunpowder and everything. Like, it's the fucking revolutionary war, like, put that shit down there and just like, boom.

And like the bullet just doesn't even kill anybody. Just like lodges deep into the skin and hurts. Like, that'd be fun. I feel like this guy deserves it. Like, you know, I mean, the guy did just shoot somebody in cold blood. Before this year, only Utah had carried out firing squad executions in 1977, 1997, 1996, and 2010. Utah was just days away from conducting a firing squad execution this month before the Utah Supreme Court intervened. The state was set to execute Ralph Menzies by firing squad on September 15th for the 1986 murder of a married mother of three.

Though Menzies chose the firing squad decades ago, the state's high court halted it over concerns about his current dementia and whether he still understands why he's being executed. I mean, so the guy killed a married mother of three in 1986. Who gives a shit if he's got dementia? Like, I respect the fact that you'd like to be humane and the way you go about your business. But, you know, this guy did kill a married mother of three and has been sentenced to death for it. So, like, who gives a shit if he knows why he's getting played? Like, look, I can imagine that would be frightening. You have dementia.

You have no idea while you're standing in front of a firing squad with a bag over your head ready to get shot. You have no clue why this is happening. Perhaps. But you know what else is probably pretty scary? Being a married mother of three getting murdered by this guy. So, like, perhaps, you know, being humane in this situation isn't really the move. Or it shouldn't at least be top of mind. This person murdered somebody.

person seemingly not very good and by the way how long has this person been in prison the murder happened in 1986 that's 40 years ago like how long do we just keep these people on death row now I'm interested in this guy now I need to know about Ralph Menzies Ralph Menzies he's got a whole goddamn Wikipedia Ralph LeRoy Menzies is an American convicted murderer currently on death throw for the 1986 murder of Marine Hunsaker, a gas station attendant who he kidnapped before slitting her throat. He was convicted of the murder and sentenced to death on March 23rd, 1988. Okay.

So this guy has been imprisoned since 1988. In May, let's see, since Menzies has become Utah's longest serving death row inmate, having been sentenced to death in 1988. So, like, at what point are you just no longer on death row and you're just, you know, in prison? Right? Like, if you've been in prison for 37 years, at this point, you're not on death row. Like, death is like, ooh, death is imminent. It appears that death has not been imminent.

You've just been in jail. It's kind of like just a suggestion. Like, death row? Ah, maybe. Let's see. So, let's see, investigations and arrest, murder trial. After his sentencing, Ralph Menzies remained on death row for more than three decades. And throughout these years, he filed multiple appeals against his death sentence.

It was scheduled to be carried out at least twice, but delayed due to his appeals. So that's all you got to do. Like, I'm going to appeal. Like, I don't think that's how appeals should work. Like, hey, 37 years later, still on death row. the Utah Supreme Court rejected Menzies' appeal for a retrial, finding that transcription errors caused by a reporter covering his trial to not provide sufficient grounds to reopen his case. So just like years and years and years, like 2014, rejected appeal, 2019, rejected appeal, 2022, dismissed an appeal, 2003

exhausted all of his standard appeals and now here we are boy this is fascinating so this dude is still alive 67 years of age when he killed that lady he was about 30 so he has spent the last 37 or so years on quote unquote death row

he's just in jail there is no death row you're just in jail Anywho More to come