It was the second time someone was executed by a firing squad in SC in five weeks and only the fifth in the U.S. since 1976.

A firing squad on Friday executed a South Carolina man who killed an off-duty police officer, the second time the rare execution method has been used by the state in the past five weeks. Mikal Mahdi gave no final statement and did not look to his right toward the nine witnesses in the room behind bulletproof glass and bars once the curtain opened.

Mikal Mahdi’s execution came about a month after the first person in state history was killed in such a manner. Before that, no person had been killed by a firing squad in the United States in 15 years.