She received two doses of the drug in a failed attempt by the state of Tennessee to execute her on Wednesday, September 31.
Christa Pike remains on a ventilator with hospital staff working to save her life and clear the pentobarbital she was administered from her system, her attorneys said, according to The Guardian.
Pike’s attorneys stated in a court filing that they believed problems with intravenous lines caused the pentobarbital to flow into her body instead of her bloodstream.
“Apparently at no point did any member of the execution team realize that the IV lines were not correctly placed or that the veins had blown and that the pentobarbital was, in whole or in part, entering Ms Pike’s body,” they wrote.
“We ask that the public and the media respect that privacy as well. Pike, 50, was sentenced to death in 1996 in connection with the 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer . Pike was 20 at the time.
They added that instead of “remedying this failure,” the execution team went on to prepare and administer a backup set of pentobarbital syringes. In a statement reported on X by NewsNation journalist Brian Entin, Pike’s attorneys described her as “critically ill and … receiving medical care for the devastating effects of Wednesday nights events”. “We are working close with those closest to Christa to respect her wishes, safeguard her privacy and protect her rights as a patient during this extraordinarily difficult time,” the statement added. “Preserving this evidence is essential to understanding what happened, ensuring accountability and protecting Christa’s legal rights,” her attorneys’ statement said.
On Friday, Pike’s attorneys asked a state court to order Tennessee’s department of correction to preserve all evidence from her failed execution.
The Death Penalty Information Center states that the last execution of a woman in Tennessee was in 1820. This means Pike would have been the first woman to be executed in the state in more than 200 years. Pike and her then boyfriend, Tadaryl Shipp , murdered Slemmer at a job training camp in Knoxville, Tennessee. Shocking details about the case shocked the United States, including the fact that a pentagram had been carved into Slemmer’s chest. “Even more to accept how many lives I affected. I took the life of someone’s child, sister, friend. It sickens me now to think I had the ability to commit such a crime.
“It took me numerous years to even realize the gravity of what I’d done,” Pike had said in an earlier petition for clemency.
