On November 11, the United States commemorated Veterans Day, a federal holiday since 1954 created to thank veterans of all foreign wars. But how thankful are we really? A quick look at how many veterans have been executed or are facing execution—literally being killed by the country they served-- indicates that the answer is, not so much.
According to the Death Penalty Information Center, in the modern era of the death penalty (since 1972), at least 226 military veterans have been executed in the United States. This constitutes 14 percent of all people who have been executed in this time period. As of November 10, seven veterans have been executed in 2025, which is 22 percent of all people executed or currently under death warrant. Some 200 veterans remain on death row today—approximately 10 percent of the death row population—despite veterans constituting only 6 percent of the overall population.
Florida is the worst state regarding the death penalty and veterans. As of November 11, Florida is scheduled to execute a record 18 men, one-third of whom are veterans. As of November 12, DeSantis has overseen the execution of seven U.S. military veterans, including five in 2025 alone.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has issued a death warrant for Bryan Frederick Jennings, a 66-year-old Marine Corps veteran. Jennings is set to be executed on November 13, just two days after Veterans Day. In addition to his veteran status, the warrant was signed without the individualized review required for due process. At the time of that DeSantis signed the warrant, Mr. Jennings did not have state-appointed post-conviction counsel, which violates Florida state law requiring that all death-sentenced prisoners receive continuous representation. Nor has Mr. Jennings’ case been reviewed for clemency in more than 35 years, making the decision to sign his death warrant without any transparent review process odd, at best. One week later, Florida has issued a warrant to execute U.S. Army veteran Richard “Malik” Randolph (Malik Abdul-Sajjad).
Many of these veterans have suffered deeply for their service. Each of these veterans has endured the invisible wounds of post-traumatic stress disorder, traumatic brain injuries, Gulf War Illness, or severe mental illness. Most had limited, if any, access to care. As Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty put it, “To execute a veteran who was broken by war and left without adequate care is not justice. It is a failure of duty. It is the final abandonment.”
In 2009, the United States Supreme Court recognized in Porter v. McCollum that the U.S. has “a long tradition of according leniency to veterans in recognition of their service.” In its decision, the court acknowledged that combat trauma carries “a mental and emotional toll that juries might find mitigating.” This principle is being ignored today, most notably by DeSantis, himself a veteran who served in Iraq.
Veterans are speaking out in opposition to the rash of death sentences and executions of their brethren. Ryan Sanshuck, a U.S. Army combat veteran, Purple Heart recipient, and licensed social worker who served in Operation Iraqi Freedom from 2006 to 2007 wrote in a statement on Veterans Day that, since his service, he has been “fighting a different kind of battle — one for mercy, justice, and truth.”
To truly honor veterans, we must honor their service by defending their lives. As Sanshuck so eloquently wrote, “When the State of Florida executes veterans, it tells every one of us that our pain and our service don’t matter. It says that the same government that sent us to war, and failed to care for us when we came home, is willing to throw us away when we struggle the most.”
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Laura Finley, Ph.D., syndicated by PeaceVoice, teaches in the Barry University Department of Sociology & Criminology and is the author of several academic texts in her discipline.
MORE DEATH PENALTY:
SC Supreme Court turns down inmate’s final appeal as execution nears
Stephen Bryant is scheduled to be executed by firing squad Friday night, 21 years after he killed three people
BY: SKYLAR LAIRD - NOVEMBER 11, 2025 3:51 PM
COLUMBIA — The state Supreme Court denied a death row inmate’s attempt to halt his upcoming execution by firing squad.
For 44-year-old Stephen Bryant to avoid the death chamber, he will need a federal court or the governor to intervene, both highly unlikely possibilities. His execution is scheduled to take place at 6 p.m. Friday.
Bryant pleaded guilty in 2008 to killing three people and shooting another during a string of 2004 burglaries primarily in Sumter County. In a last-ditch appeal in state court, Bryant’s attorneys argued his original attorneys did not present evidence that his mother’s heavy drinking while pregnant and childhood sexual abuse affected Bryant’s development.
Bryant’s attorneys argued that evidence may have been enough to change the sentencing judge’s mind in giving Bryant the death penalty for one of the three killings.
The state’s highest court disagreed.
Bryant’s original attorneys told the judge about the sexual abuse Bryant survived as a child, as well as his struggles in school and his history of addiction and other mental health issues, reads a Monday order signed by all five justices.
Experts testified that Bryant’s use of insecticide-sprayed marijuana and methamphetamines caused brain damage and that he was suffering post-traumatic stress disorder during the time of his crimes. Questions about whether Bryant’s mother drank heavily during her pregnancy with him, hindering his development, came up during Bryant’s sentencing. However, his mother refused to tell even his attorneys whether that was true, according to the order.
Without cooperation from Bryant’s mother, testing for fetal alcohol spectrum disorder likely would have come back inconclusive. Even if Bryant did receive a diagnosis, it would do little to bolster his case, since other mental health issues likely impaired him in similar ways, the justices wrote.
The brutality in the killing that led to Bryant’s death sentence outweighed his state of mind at the time, the order reads.
“By any stretch, (Bryant) demonstrated a high level of planning, decision making, and calculation in the course of his eight-day spree,” the justices wrote.
During those eight days, Bryant broke into multiple homes, stealing guns and ammunition along with electronics and money. He shot a fisherman, Clinton Brown, in the back, though Brown survived. Bryant picked up two victims, Cliff Gainey and Chris Burgess, in his truck before shooting them and leaving their bodies by the side of the road. Bryant received life sentences for their murders.
In the middle of his crime spree, Bryant broke into the Sumter County home of 62-year-old Willard Tietjen and shot Tietjen to death. Bryant used Tietjen’s computer, smoked his cigars and cigarettes, and answered his phone to tell Tietjen’s wife and daughter he had killed Tietjen, according to court documents.
Police found Tietjen’s body with cigarette burns on it, including in his eyes. Bryant left notes written on the walls, including, “Victim number four in two weeks, catch me if you can,” with some letters written in blood, according to court records.
That was the crime that caused a judge to sentence Bryant to death.
Unless a higher court or the governor intervenes, Bryant will be the third person in the state put to death by firing squad since legislators added the option in 2021. He will be the seventh executed in the state since the process resumed in September 2024, following an unintended 13-year hiatus.
Nationwide, there have been 41 people executed so far in 2025, according to the Death Penalty Information Center. At least six more, including Bryant, are expected to be put to death before the end of the year.
Skylar Laird covers the South Carolina Legislature and criminal justice issues. Originally from Missouri, she previously worked for The Post and Courier’s Columbia bureau.
SC Daily Gazette is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization.
A Statement on the Execution of Stephen Bryant
On November 14, 2025, the state of South Carolina executed Stephen Bryant. His execution marks the fifth execution this year, the 50th execution in the state since 1976, the third execution by firing squad in less than a year. South Carolina is now tied with Utah for the most firing squad executions since 1976.
A Statement from Executive Director, Rev. Hillary Taylor:
"Tonight, the state of South Carolina executed another man, Stephen Bryant, in our society’s name by firing squad. A man who, like other people executed in South Carolina these last 15 months, was a victim of other peoples’ violence long before he committed violence against others. In doing so, our state exposed lawyers, corrections officers, victim family members, and members of our press corps to the traumatic and bloody experience of witnessing gun violence. May God have mercy on our souls.
Our opposition to Stephen’s execution does not mean we shrug our shoulders to the crimes which he committed. We hold the memories of Clifton Dale Gainey, Willard “TJ” Tietjen Jr., and Christopher Burgess in our hearts tonight, as well as their families and community members. Nobody should have to experience the traumatic and gruesome violence they did. We can imagine the peace that 20 years of these death penalty trials has robbed them of, and we hope they receive every support for their healing after today’s execution.
Since this execution date was scheduled, most people have only heard about the violence Stephen Bryant did to others, but not the violence he himself experienced. This is because Stephen asked us to have a more muted advocacy campaign. Now that the state has killed him by firing squad, I want to take this moment to rehumanize Stephen and to speak about his trauma very plainly. When I hear his story, I picture the story in Mark’s gospel, chapter 5, where Jesus encounters a man tortured by a Legion of demons, chained among tombs, howling for help. Stephen suffered brain damage from fetal alcohol exposure, a condition that made him increasingly vulnerable to irresponsible adults in his life. He experienced horrific sexual abuse from close family members and other community members for years…people who normally take a vow of sacred trust to protect children, but instead violated Stephen. Before he committed violence, he begged family members for help. They called law enforcement, who gave them the number to a crisis hotline. Stephen then went to the local YWCA and to his probation officer, begging for help. Both referred him to a local mental health provider, but he was turned away because he couldn’t pay the $75 counseling fee. Imagine if this was your nephew, your grandchild, your neighbor.
Would you have helped him? Would you be like Jesus in Mark’s gospel who saw the young man howling and chained among the dead, and help him cast out his Legion of demons? Or would you be like the townspeople in scripture and condemn him to die, chained forever to his terrors?
Mr. Bryant is not the only person who was sentenced to death row because our society did not take care of him, and as long as we have the death penalty, he will not be the last. While South Carolina is in a three-way tie with Texas and Alabama for the second most executing state in the country, it has the fewest mental health treatment centers in the United States and is near the bottom when it comes to quality of care. Over 2 million South Carolinians live in under-resourced areas when it comes to mental health first aid. As a former pastor in a rural county, I have lived in these spaces: I know what it is like to have community members suffering from severe mental illness and have no resources to help them when they call for help.
Instead of punishing people for the abuse they incurred at the hands of adults who were never held accountable for their crimes, what would it look like for the state of South Carolina to take victims of violence seriously? We may never know. As long as we have the death penalty, we will continue to be a state that refuses to solve the problem of violence.
Before Stephen’s execution, we approached him about our "In Lieu of Violence Initiative." In memorials, the phrase “In Lieu of Flowers” encourages donations to a cause that honors a deceased person. Our “In Lieu of Violence” Initiative applies this concept to individuals on South Carolina’s Death Row—transforming passive mourning and vigil into meaningful change—offering a vision where justice is rooted in prevention rather than retribution. For the next week, with Stephen’s input and consent, SCADP is fundraising for a children’s advocacy center in our state in lieu of violence. If you would like to donate to this fund, please go to www.scadp.org and click on the yellow button on the front page that says “In Lieu of Violence.” We are more than the worst thing we’ve ever done, and we are more than the worst thing that’s ever happened to us. SCADP hopes this initiative will help South Carolinians understand Stephen’s desire to make sure what happened to him does not happen to other children. ”
The mission of South Carolinians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (SCADP) is to abolish the death penalty and catalyze criminal justice reform in South Carolina.
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