Utah may execute 2 in June

Utah could execute two men by firing squad at the end of June if death warrants are signed by district judges this week.

If the men — white separatist Troy Kell and serial killer Roberto Arguelles — are executed, it would be the first time Utah has carried out the death penalty twice in the same year.

Kell and Arguelles are set for hearings Tuesday and Thursday, respectively. Under Utah law, if neither man files an appeal, each would have to be executed within 60 days of a judge's order, Assistant Attorney General Thomas Brunker said. He expects both warrants will be signed.

Both Kell and Arguelles have elected to die by firing squad. Utah is the only state that still allows those convicted of capital offenses to choose a firing squad as a method of execution, though Idaho and Oklahoma retain it as a legal option.

Lethal injection is most common.

"We do think one or the other of them will file an appeal," Utah Department of Corrections spokesman Jack Ford said. "If they don't, it will be really unusual. We've never done two firing squads."

Utah has executed six men over the past 26 years, since garnering international attention for ending a nationwide moratorium on the death penalty with the firing-squad execution in January 1977 of double-murderer Gary Gilmore.

The last time the state carried out a death warrant was April 1999, when Joseph Mitchell Parsons died by lethal injection, having been convicted of murdering a California motorist who gave him a ride. In January 1996, John Albert Taylor was executed by firing squad for the murder of 11-year-old Charla King. Executed previously were 1980s child murderer Arthur Gary Bishop, and Pierre Dale Selby and William Andrews, both involved in 1974's Ogden Hi-Fi Shop killings.

By law, Kell and Arguelles will have 30 days to file an appeal after their death warrants are signed. In capital cases, a conviction is automatically appealed to the Utah Supreme Court after a conviction. A death warrant comes before a district judge only after a conviction has been upheld by the the higher court.

Kell, 34, was convicted in 1996 of stabbing and killing Lonnie Blackmon while both were incarcerated at the Gunnison unit of the Utah State Prison. Investigators said Kell stabbed Blackmon 67 times with a homemade knife in a racially motivated attack.