Salt Lake City, March 12 (RHC)-- U.S. lawmakers in the state of Utah have passed a bill that would allow execution by the use of firing squad if lethal injection drugs are not provided. The State Senate of Utah passed the bill on Tuesday, but it is not clear whether Utah Governor Gary Herbert will sign it into law.

The measure makes Utah the only state to resume the use of firing squads after the state lawmakers abandoned it several years ago. The legislation, however, keeps lethal injection as the primary method of execution.

The legislation’s sponsor, Republican Representative Paul Ray, argued that the measure is faster and more humane form of execution than the botched execution. He told reporters in Salt Lake City: "We would love to get the lethal injection worked out so we can continue with that but if not, now we have a backup plan."

In several cases, it took hours for inmates to die after they received lethal injection drugs. Last year, a flaw in the process of execution of an inmate in Oklahoma led to a tragedy. Clayton Lockett died in agony 43 minutes after receiving the first part of a lethal cocktail used for the execution. In another case in Arizona, it took almost two hours for the condemned man to die last year after he received the lethal injection.

Utah, among several other states, began to seek out new forms of capital punishment after the tragic cases of Oklahoma and Arizona occurred. Opponents of using firing squad, however, said the practice is a cruel holdover from Utah’s Wild West days and will earn the state international condemnation.