Fort Hood shooter to be executed by firing squad: everything you need to know | Crime News

US President Donald Trump approved the firing squad death of Nidal Malik Hasan, a former Army officer convicted of committing a 2009 mass shooting at Fort Hood, a military base in Texas.

This decision, if it materializes, will restart executions in the army, which had not carried out them since 1961.

Death sentences, as well as executions in the US military, are rare and require presidential approval.

Under the army’s code of military justice, premeditated murder is punishable by death, but the procedure is often strict and prolonged.

However, the Trump administration has been more willing to seek the death penalty for serious crimes, particularly against civilians.

Here’s what we know about the case:

What is the presidential decree?

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth initially recommended an execution order against Hasan, and Trump has now approved it, according to a statement released by Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell.

Parnell said the time and date of the execution would be set by Army Secretary Adam Telle, who is serving in his role on an acting basis.

“The day of reckoning for Hasan has finally arrived,” he wrote.

What happened at Fort Hood?

On November 5, 2009, American-born Army psychiatrist Major Hasan entered an Army treatment center at Fort Hood, shouted “Allahu Akbar” (God is great), and opened fire on colleagues waiting for medical treatment.

Thirteen people were killed, including a pregnant soldier, and 32 others were injured during the 10-minute shootout. Analysts called it the worst shooting at a US military base targeting members of the armed forces.

Hasan was shot multiple times after two police officers attacked him and remains paralyzed from the waist down.

What happened during the trial?

Hasan was immediately court-martialled, and military prosecutors sought the death penalty against him from the start.

However, the process will take place over several years, even after his conviction – largely because the US military is opposed to capital punishment.

During the trial, Hasan represented himself and admitted to the attacks, saying he was trying to stop deployments to Afghanistan and the killing of his fellow Muslims. It was to be deployed weeks later.

The investigation found that Hasan exchanged emails with Yemeni-American academic Anwar al-Awlaki, accused of links to al-Qaeda, before the shooting. He had also repeatedly expressed his opposition to the American wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to his colleagues as well as the treatment of Muslims in the army.

Hasan made little effort to defend himself, and his appointed lawyers claimed his testimony helped the opposing side.

He was indicted and convicted of 13 counts of premeditated murder in 2013, and jurors recommended the maximum sentence of death. Controversially, Hasan was accused of “workplace violence” because the military justice code does not address the crime of “terrorism.”

The ruling was further delayed by appeals ordered by the military, not because Hasan requested them.

In 2020, the United States Court of Criminal Appeals upheld the death sentence against Hasan, and in 2023, the United States Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces did the same. In March 2025, the United States Supreme Court rejected a mandatory request for judicial review.

In September 2025, Hegseth announced that he was seeking presidential approval for Hasan’s execution.

At the time, there were no reports that Hegseth specifically sought death by firing squad.

The President has the ultimate authority to specify the designated method of execution.

Other forms of execution could have been lethal injection or hanging, which the US military has used in the past.

And then?

Although Trump’s approval will mark the beginning of a series of steps toward preparing for execution, Hasan can still put the process on hold for years by appealing to the federal civil court system.

However, this might be unlikely as Hasan made no effort to defend himself during the trial.

He was incarcerated in the U.S. disciplinary barracks at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, where three other men have also been on military death row for years.

Among them is Hasan Akbar, convicted of two counts of murder after attacking army comrades on a Kuwait base in 2003, during the invasion of Iraq.

Another case is serial killer and rapist Ronald Gray, convicted of four counts of murder and eight counts of rape in 2008. His execution was approved that same year under President George W. Bush, but the process was stayed by a judge.

Timothy Hennis, a former sergeant, was convicted in 2010 of a triple murder and is also on death row.

The last military execution took place in 1961, when former soldier John Bennett was hanged for the rape of an 11-year-old girl.