Failed ‘tortuous’ execution attempt against Christa Pike reignites death penalty debate: NPR
Media witnesses recount the moments before Christa Pike’s execution was stopped Wednesday in Nashville, Tennessee.
George Walker IV/AP
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George Walker IV/AP
The botched execution in Tennessee of Christa Pike, who survived despite two doses of lethal injection on Wednesday, has reignited a furious debate over the death penalty in the United States.
Witnesses say Pike, who was strapped to a gurney, was given a supposedly lethal dose of the barbiturate pentobarbital, but after several minutes she said her arm felt hot and asked if it was supposed to feel that way. She then asked “please try my shoulder higher”.
A second dose was administered and the 50-year-old woman, who has been on death row for murder since she was 18, appeared to lose consciousness but continued to breathe and snore. His lawyers made emergency calls and the execution was halted. Pike was taken to a hospital, where she remains in critical condition and receiving “life-saving treatment,” according to her attorneys. It is not yet known whether she suffered brain damage.
“At this point, we don’t know the consequences of the chemical torture she endured,” Pike’s attorney, Randy Spivey, said during a video briefing, calling what happened in the death chamber “tortifying” and “cruel.”
The Death Penalty Information Center (DPI), a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization, said Pike was the first person in the history of capital punishment to survive after being injected with lethal drugs. Other people have survived failed execution attempts when execution staff were unable to establish IV lines.
“This botched attempt is the worst we have ever seen and unlike any other botched execution in the modern era,” Robin M. Maher, executive director of DPI, said in a statement.
“What happened to Christa Pike can be attributed to the extreme secrecy that Tennessee officials maintained over their execution procedures, their refusal to answer reasonable questions, and their refusal to accept responsibility for their mistakes,” she continued. Media are not allowed to witness key stages of the process, including the insertion of IV lines.
Pike, who was convicted and convicted of the 1995 murder of classmate Colleen Slemmer, whom she considered a romantic rival, would have been the first woman to be executed in Tennessee in more than 200 years. But this is the second failed attempt in the state this year, after Tennessee halted the execution of Tony Carruthers in May when medical staff were unable to insert a second IV line.
Gov. Bill Lee, a Republican, has now canceled executions in the state for the rest of the year. He opened an investigation into what happened to Pike and said the botched execution “should not have happened.” However, he emphasized at a press conference that “the people of Tennessee have determined that the death penalty is the appropriate punishment for the most heinous crimes committed in the state.”
U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn, who is running to replace Lee, agreed but said the state should “bring back the electric chair” rather than resort to lethal injection.
Calls for abolition
However, Blackburn’s Democratic opponent, Jerri Green, condemned the practice, saying, “The fact is that the death penalty has always been inhumane, costly and biased.” »
“As a public defender, I have encountered a few too many people who were wrongly convicted on death row and then exonerated… If we say we are pro-life, that means we must be against the death penalty,” his statement read.
Kathleen Walter prays in the area designated for those opposed to the death penalty outside the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution before the scheduled execution of Christa Pike on Wednesday in Nashville, Tennessee.
George Walker IV/AP
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George Walker IV/AP
In May, Democratic Senators Dick Durbin, Democrat of Illinois, and Representative Ayanna Pressley, Democrat of Mass., reintroduced legislation to try to abolish the death penalty, after the Justice Department announced it was bringing back firing squads. The bill was referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee.
“The death penalty is not a punishment reserved for the worst of the worst; it is a punishment reserved for the poorest of the poor. And it is a disproportionate punishment that black Americans face,” Durbin said at the time.
“It is far from certain that the death penalty fulfills its primary objective. There is still no conclusive evidence that the death penalty deters people from committing heinous crimes compared to the threat of life in prison,” he said.
Americans’ views on capital punishment have changed over the decades, according to a Gallup poll. It was in the 1960s that approval ratings for the death penalty last fell below 50 percent. Approval was at its highest level in the mid-1990s, but has declined again since then, with 52% of respondents saying they favor the death penalty in 2025.
On Thursday, international human rights organization Amnesty International called on the United States to abolish the death penalty, saying: “As the death penalty continues to decline around the world, the United States remains increasingly isolated. »
In the United States, executions have increased. Last year, 47 people were executed nationwide, the most since 2009. Data shows that Florida carried out the most executions, accounting for 19 of those carried out last year.
Methods also differ between states, with the majority of executions in 2025 taking place by lethal injection. However, three of them were shot and five were inhaled with nitrogen, which UN experts say amounts to “state-sanctioned torture.”
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