One law could save killer from second execution, expert says
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Christa Pike is awake and speaking, but the question about what ultimately happens to the convicted murderer has only grown more complicated - with one expert suggesting she legally has already been served her sentence.
Pike, 50, survived a lethal injection involving two doses of pentobarbital in the US state of Tennessee last Wednesday.
Christa Pike survived a lethal injection - but could still face execution. J. Miles Cary, Knoxville News Sentinel/Imagn Images via CNN
She was taken to hospital after the execution was called off, and remained unconscious and receiving life-saving care until today, her attorneys have said.
Already, debate has ensued about whether Pike will - or legally can - face execution again.
She was sentenced to death in 1996 aged 20 for the brutal murder of fellow student Colleen Slemmer in 1995, when Pike was just 18.
Her lawyers have said in their most recent filing today that they continue to ask Governor Bill Lee to commute Pike’s sentence to life in prison.
Lee has already called a halt to executions in the state for the rest of 2026 and for an independent, third-party review of the botched execution.
Another Tennessee death-row inmate, Tony Carruthers, also survived an execution this year, though in his case it was because the executioners could not establish an IV line.
“The case is unprecedented in the modern era of lethal injection,” the US-based Death Penalty Information Centre said.
“Seven death sentenced people previously survived failed execution attempts, but in those cases no execution drugs were administered.”
Just as Pike’s survival is unprecedented, so is her legal position.
Will Pike face execution again?
Legal experts are wary of making a definitive judgement but say there are a lot of factors to consider.
Some have questioned whether the state would be able to try to execute Pike again.
In addition to questions about competency - whether she can understand why she would be put to death - Pike has strong arguments that it would be cruel and unusual to try again, and that it would violate the prohibition on double jeopardy, trying or punishing someone twice for the same offence, said Deborah Denno, a Fordham Law professor who has studied execution methods for 36 years.
“She has satisfied this very, very high standard for cruel and unusual punishment,” Denno said.
Pike murdered Colleen Slemmer in 1995. Supplied
“She also has a very good double-jeopardy argument. They carried out every aspect of the execution. She didn’t die, but every process they intended, they did it.”
Seattle University Law Professor Michael Russo, who handled capital cases as a public defender in Los Angeles, called the failed execution horrible, but said he doubted whether the Supreme Court would stop the state from trying again on double-jeopardy grounds, should it decide to do so.
“There’s nobody else in the history of the death penalty in this country who has gone through what she’s been through,” Russo said. But, he added,
“I think what this Supreme Court would say is, her sentence was to die - to be executed - not to suffer an attempt at execution.”
The US Constitution forbids “cruel and unusual punishment”.
The question of Pike’s competency also remains up in the air, despite her regaining consciousness.
Dr Joel Zivot, a professor of anaesthesiology and surgery in Atlanta who consulted as an expert for Pike’s legal team, said the development “bodes well for a good recovery”.
But, he added, it could be weeks or months before anyone knows exactly what her recovery might look like, and whether her competency could be restored to a level that might enable the state to try again to execute her.
“She’s still in the ICU,” he said.
“She has recovered to a certain degree that she’s able to be off a ventilator and able to speak, but in no way would I announce her free of further serious risk.
“There’s still a lot of bad things that can happen here, even when everyone is doing their job well.”
One advocate has even said Pike, who was repeatedly sexually assaulted from a young age, should be considered a victim of “gender-based violence” in the context of her failed execution.
“The state’s deliberate infliction of gratuitous pain as she lay strapped to a gurney should be viewed as an act of gender-based violence,” Cornell Law School Clinical Professor Sandra Babcock said, in a release from the DPIC.
Christa Pike, then aged 18, cries after being sentenced to death on March 30, 1996 in Knoxville. WBIR-TV via AP
Triple murderer Carruthers was granted a year’s reprieve by the state after his execution was botched, but he still faces execution, and Pike could receive similar treatment.
Tennessee lawmakers have also said they will consider broadening the state’s execution methods.
Gubernatorial candidate Senator Marsha Blackburn has called for the return of the electric chair, while Pike herself requested a firing squad ahead of her injection.
Legally, the electric chair is a method of execution in Tennessee, though only in cases where a lethal injection cannot be carried out - such as a lack of drugs - and for inmates were sentenced before January 1, 1999.
- Reported with Associated Press
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