Crimeupdated 1h ago2 min read
Archive photo · 11 October 2008Christa Pike Says Tennessee Failed Execution Left Her In Constant Pain, Blames Incompetence
“She is now able to speak in full sentences and walk on her own.”
“I still struggle to speak.”
Photo: Harrison Keely, CC BY 4.0 · Cropped for layout
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Survived botched lethal injection; reports constant physical and mental pain a month later. Blames the failure on incompetence of authorities.
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Pike breaks silence
Christa Pike said she remains in constant pain and struggles to speak a month after Tennessee tried to execute her with lethal injection, and she blamed the failure on “incompetence.”
“‘There hasn’t been a moment since that night when I haven’t been in pain.”
Pike told reporters she had entered the execution chamber “prepared to die” and woke up alone and confused in a hospital bed, where she spent days connected to a ventilator.
Pike said she still feels pain in her body and also in her mind and soul, and she added, “I don’t know why I survived that night. I don’t know what comes next.”
The state tried to execute Pike on Sept. 30 for the 1995 stabbing death of 19-year-old classmate Colleen Slemmer, and Pike was 18 when she and her boyfriend tortured and killed Slemmer.
Gov. Bill Lee suspended all executions and ordered an independent review after the botched attempt, and Lee said, “I suspect her sentence will be the same as before unless the courts decide otherwise.”
What Pike says went wrong
Pike’s statement described the aftermath of the failed execution, and she said she woke up alone in a hospital and has not had a moment without pain since that night. Pike’s lawyers said doctors believed she had brain death and had considered removing her life support before she opened her eyes and tried to speak the following morning, according to The Tennessean. The journalists’ chronology described Pike receiving the first dose of pentobarbital around 7:40 p.m. and the second near 8:00 p.m., and officials halting the execution after an hour and calling emergency services at 8:40 p.m.
The chronology also said the person who made the first 911 call did not provide the code required by protocol to verify it was not a prank, and that omission triggered 26 minutes of confusion that delayed the paramedics’ arrival. Pike’s lawyers said the medical team took more than an hour to place IV lines and used at least seven needles, and they said her arms became swollen, bruised, and blistered.
Sentence, pause, and next steps
Gov. Bill Lee called for an investigation into what happened during the failed execution and postponed the state’s other lethal injection scheduled this year, and the prison chief resigned.
“I suspect her sentence will be the same as before unless determined otherwise by the courts.”
Pike said she was thankful for the medical workers who saved her life and for people who showed her kindness, and she told reporters, “For now, I am trying to heal, one day at a time.”
Pike remained in the infirmary at the Debra K. Johnson Rehabilitation Center after being discharged from the hospital on October 10, and she said she is recovering and getting stronger.
WSMV said Lee paused executions through the end of the year to determine what went wrong in Pike’s attempted execution, and it said Frank Strada resigned from his role as commissioner of the Department of Correction.
Lee told reporters that Pike is still incarcerated under the laws of the State of Tennessee, and he said, “I suspect her sentence will be the same as before unless determined otherwise by the courts.”