Christa Pike has pneumonia and cannot move her arms, lawyers say
A Nashville judge has ordered Tennessee to preserve the drugs, needles and messages tied to the failed execution, while her lawyers press for a commuted sentence.
By
Noah Bennett
Christa Pike, the Tennessee death row inmate who survived her Sept. 30 execution attempt, has pneumonia and cannot move her arms or hands, her attorneys said.
In brief
- 30 execution attempt, has pneumonia and cannot move her arms or hands, her attorneys said.
- Pike was given two doses of the lethal injection drug at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution and was then taken to a hospital in Nashville.
- Pike was 18 at the time of the killing, and she spent more than three decades on Tennessee’s death row.
A recovery nobody predicted
According to CBS News, Pike, 50, also has a blood clot in her arm and could not swallow, which kept her from eating. Her lawyers say hospital workers are trying to clear the lethal drug pentobarbital from her system. They describe her prognosis as unclear and expect, at minimum, a long recovery.
Her lawyers believed on Monday that she was brain dead and expected life support to be removed. Attorney Randall Spivey said what followed surprised everyone around her.
“But on Tuesday, to the shock of everyone, including me, including her team, and including the medical team, Christa woke up and began talking.”
Randall Spivey, one of Christa Pike’s lawyers
When she first woke, Pike was confused and disoriented. Her lawyers say she still has “cognitive confusion,” but that she has been speaking with the people around her. Spivey said she is shackled to her hospital bed.
Spivey also described the swelling in her limbs. He said her arms and hands are “tremendously swollen” and that doctors do not know what function she will regain. In his words, “Her hands looked like if you were to blow up a surgical glove.”
What happened in the chamber
Pike was given two doses of the lethal injection drug at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution and was then taken to a hospital in Nashville. The Death Penalty Information Center says no one else is known to have lived through an execution attempt in the United States. It was Tennessee’s second botched execution this year, following that of Tony Carruthers in May.
- Pike receives two doses of the lethal drug at Riverbend and is hospitalized in Nashville.
- Her lawyers believe she is brain dead and expect life support to be removed.
- She wakes up and begins talking.
Her lawyers say the all-female execution team used at least seven needles during an ordeal lasting more than two hours, and that one needle was bent 90 degrees when removed. In an emergency motion, they accused staff of failing to establish an IV line properly and of missing a “blown vein.” Those are allegations by her attorneys. Spivey said, “I don’t have an explanation for what happened.”
A judge orders the evidence preserved
Chancellor I’Ashea Myles of Davidson County Chancery Court ordered the state to preserve drugs, IV lines, needles, catheters, restraints, gurneys, and written, digital and encrypted communications connected to the attempt. The judge called the case “unique, to say the least,” canberradaily.com.au reported.
The Tennessee Department of Correction opposed the order as “duplicative and unnecessary,” saying it was already required to preserve evidence. The judge had not yet ruled on a request to take residual drug traces for chemical analysis.
Luke Ihnen, another of Pike’s attorneys, pointed to the secrecy around the state’s execution procedures. He said, “We don’t know what they have, because they won’t tell us.”
Political and legal fallout
- Gov. Bill Lee denied clemency before the execution.
- He then canceled the one remaining execution scheduled in Tennessee this year and said an investigation would examine what went wrong.
- The state correctional commissioner stepped down, although an agency statement said protocols were followed.
- Pike’s lawyers are urging Lee to commute her sentence to life without parole.
- Assistant Attorney General Will Ayers told the court no execution order is pending for Pike.
Ihnen nonetheless said: “The state has made no promises that Ms. Pike will not be subject to a future execution.”
The 1995 case behind the sentence
Pike was convicted in 1995 of murdering Colleen Slemmer, a 19-year-old classmate. Pike was 18 at the time of the killing, and she spent more than three decades on Tennessee’s death row.
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