Killer receiving ‘life-saving care’ after botched execution

A US woman who survived two lethal injections is in a critical condition and receiving “life-saving care”, her lawyers said this morning.

Convicted murderer Christa Pike, 50, was scheduled for execution in the US state of Tennessee yesterday.

An appeals court had temporarily granted a stay, but that was overturned just hours later by the US Supreme Court.

Pike received two doses of pentobarbital, her attorneys said a filing to immediately halt the execution.

Media witnesses said Pike was “snoring” after the injections before the microphone from the execution chamber was cut off and witnesses were escorted out.

“When the curtains were opened, she was kind of inconsistently going in and out of snores and silence,” media witness Tori Gressner said.

“When the curtains closed the final time at 8.05, we could consistently hear her snoring, and then it kind of developed into a snore squeak and then a snore, and even at 8.53 when the microphone was cut off, we could still hear snoring.”

Read more

Tennessee halts executions after death row inmate survives two lethal injections

Another witness, Catherine Sweeney, said Pike had said there was a spot on her arm that was “burning and hurting” and asked if that was normal.

“None of it was normal. I covered all the executions last year and most of the ones this year,” Sweeney said.

“We haven’t seen anything like it. It went really poorly.”

This morning, her attorneys confirmed Pike was still alive but that there was not much information about her condition.

“Christa is alive right now. We don’t have a sense of her prognosis or much update on her health at the moment,” attorney Randy Spivey said at a news conference.

“What we have been told is that she is in a critical condition, receiving life-saving care. That is the extent that we have at the moment.”

Spivey said at least seven needles had been used in an execution attempt he said amounted to “torture”.

He said Pike had been co-operative during the procedure, even suggesting locations the needles might have more effect.

Her other attorney, Steve Ferrell, said Pike had feared a lethal injection execution might not proceed smoothly due to her existing blood disorder that made it difficult for needles to get into her veins.

Florida-based US attorney Ken Turkel said the failed execution was likely to trigger an avalanche of political and legal consequences – though it was difficult to predict the outcomes.

“Her defence lawyers are obviously going to file a motion saying this was the essence of why you don’t allow it, right? This is cruel and unusual,” he told Today.

“They’ll probably have to get a new death warrant.

“There could be a civil suit, you know, for the pain she suffered.”

Meanwhile, with a stay on executions in place for Tennessee, Turkel said it was possible Pike’s death sentence could be reconsidered.

“There’s certainly been cases throughout the US where it was tried more than once and, you know, the sentence doesn’t change absent a judge adjudicating that,” he said.

“So right now she would be back on death row once she’s healthy again and remain there as that hashes out.”

He said he doubted Tennessee would cease imposing the death penalty long-term, but there could be an alteration of the method, noting that Pike herself had asked for a firing squad.

Executions postponed

Overnight, Republican Governor Bill Lee indefinitely postponed Pike’s execution and Tennessee’s lone remaining one that had been scheduled for this year. He also ordered an independent review of what happened, calling it “deeply disturbing”.

But Pike's lawyers said such a review would be insufficient.

Pike, 50, was sentenced to death for a murder she committed at age 18. She would have been the first woman executed in Tennessee in more than 200 years.

An appeals court stopped the lethal injection an hour before it was scheduled to begin, but the US Supreme Court overturned that stay hours later.

It was the second time this year that Tennessee was unable to complete an execution, though in the other case, officials couldn't find a suitable vein for an IV line so the drugs weren't administered.

May Martinez, whose daughter was murdered by Pike and her boyfriend and who traveled to Nashville to watch the execution, told NBC News that “it was a mess”.

Lethal injection debate reignites

The botched execution has also reignited the debate over the state’s execution procedures, including its single-drug lethal injections.

“There are very few answers this morning. It’s very early,” Lee told reporters overnight at an unrelated event, noting he had received no updates on Pike’s condition.

“The people of our state deserve to have those questions answered.”

He called what happened “deeply disturbing” and said it appeared prison staff followed procedure.

The Tennessee Department of Correction said in a statement that it “followed every step of the State’s lawful, established execution protocol approved by the Attorney General’s Office.”

Tennessee changed its execution method two years ago

Tennessee announced in 2024 that it was switching from a three-drug series for lethal injections to the single drug pentobarbital. That came more than two years after the state abruptly halted the execution of Oscar Smith and acknowledged it had failed to ensure its lethal injection drugs had been tested properly.

Robin M Maher, executive director of the Death Penalty Information Centre, said what Pike experienced is “singular and unparalleled” in that she survived long enough to be moved to a hospital.

Seven other people have survived medical problems due to an execution team's failure to access a vein to administer lethal injection drugs, but no one has stayed alive after receiving the drugs used in such executions, she said.

Executions in the US have fallen sharply since the beginning of this century amid growing public opposition and concerns about the costs and the drugs used. But the number of executions nearly doubled last year behind a record increase in Florida.

Pike would have been the 30th person executed in the US this year.

Pike was awake in the execution chamber

Strapped to a gurney in the execution chamber, Pike described herself as at peace.

When asked if she had any last words, Pike said several things, including, “I’m at peace. I’m ready to be free. ... This is a happy day.”

“I’m going to leave this world the way I spent most of my life and that is in love,” she said.

Lawyers for Pike filed an emergency motion with the Tennessee Supreme Court seeking to immediately halt and stay the execution after it became apparent she had survived the two dosages, saying she was in “unnecessary agony” and the procedure violated her right to be executed free of cruel and unusual punishment. They also filed motions with two other courts.

Last May, Tennessee officials called off the lethal injection of Tony Carruthers, who was convicted of kidnapping and killing three people in 1994, after executioners tried for over an hour but failed to find a suitable vein for a backup IV line.

Pike didn't deny her role in the killing

Pike and her boyfriend were convicted of the fatal stabbing of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, a classmate. The killing stoked fears of Satan worship because of a pentagram carved on Slemmer’s body.

Pike’s boyfriend wasn’t eligible for the death penalty because he was 17 at the time of the killing and received a sentence of life in prison. He was denied parole last year.

A third person, an 18-year-old woman, served as a lookout and received parole in exchange for her cooperation.

Pike told prosecutors at the time she thought Slemmer was trying to steal her boyfriend.

While she claimed she didn’t intend to kill Slemmer, she also took a fragment of the 19-year-old’s skull as a grisly souvenir she bragged about to another student.

Pike didn’t dispute that she helped kill Slemmer, but supporters argued that Pike’s age at the time of the murder, her mental illness and her allegations of severe sexual abuse should be considered.

She was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder after the killing.

“It took me numerous years to even realize the gravity of what I’d done,” she once said.