Electric chair tested and firing squad prepared, South Carolina prison director says

South Carolina's prisons director said Wednesday that state is ready to carry out an execution next month that would mark its first in more than 13 years. Corrections Director Bryan Stirling said South Carolina's supply of a common lethal injection drug is pure, its electric chair has been tested and the firing squad has the ammunition and training needed to put condemned inmate Freddie Owens to death in September.

Stirling was ordered by the state Supreme Court to submit a sworn statement to the lawyer for Owens certifying that all three methods of putting a prisoner to death are available for his scheduled Sept. 20 execution.

Owens' lawyers have said they will review the statement, and if they don't think it is adequate, they will ask the state Supreme Court or federal judges to consider it.