Christa Pike, a 50-year-old death row inmate in Tennessee, remains unconscious and on a ventilator after a failed execution attempt. Pike's lawyers disclosed her condition on Friday, two days after Tennessee officials attempted to execute her with two doses of pentobarbital. The execution attempt was carried out at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville on Wednesday. Pike was taken to a hospital in the Nashville area after the execution attempt failed.
Pike's lawyers, Stephen Ferrell and Luke Ihnen, said she was receiving treatment for the effects of the drug and had suffered significant injuries to both arms. They filed an emergency motion asking a Nashville court to order the Tennessee Department of Correction to preserve evidence relating to the failed execution. Pike had been scheduled to die by lethal injection for the 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, a fellow Job Corps worker.
The Tennessee Department of Correction said it followed the state's approved execution procedure. The department stated that the lethal injection chemical used in the protocol had consistently been effective and that the procedure did not permit additional steps beyond those carried out. However, media witnesses reported that Pike appeared to remain alive after the first dose of pentobarbital was administered and that a second dose was subsequently given.
Witnesses also reported hearing Pike breathing and snoring after the drugs had been administered. Tennessee Governor Bill Lee has ordered a third-party review of the incident and halted the state's next scheduled execution. Lee said the state needed to determine why the outcome differed from previous executions. Pike's lawyers have called for her death sentence to be commuted, arguing that she suffered severe physical trauma during the failed execution.
Pike's lawyers had previously warned courts that she had difficulty with intravenous access because of her medical condition and small veins. The failed execution has raised questions about what happens legally when a prisoner survives after receiving lethal injection drugs. Pike was sentenced to death in 1996 after being found guilty of killing Slemmer in a remote area of the University of Tennessee Agricultural campus.
Pike was 18 when she committed the crime. Her planned execution would have made her the first woman executed by Tennessee in more than 200 years. The case is considered unusual because previous failed lethal-injection executions in the US have generally involved authorities being unable to establish an intravenous line before administering the drugs.
Legal experts have noted that Pike's case is different because the lethal drug was administered, yet she survived. There is historical precedent for prisoners surviving failed executions and later facing another execution attempt. Pike's lawyers are now seeking to preserve evidence from Wednesday's execution while her medical and legal future remains uncertain.
Key points
- The Tennessee Department of Correction followed the state's approved execution procedure.
- Pike's lawyers have called for her death sentence to be commuted.
- Governor Bill Lee has ordered a third-party review of the incident.
