Christa Pike remains on ventilator after failed execution in Tennessee

Christa Pike remained hospitalized, unconscious and on a machine helping her breathe after her failed execution in Tennessee, her attorneys said in a court filing Friday.

The attorneys said hospital staff were working to save Pike’s life and clear the pentobarbital she was administered from her system as of late Thursday.

Pike received two doses of the drug in a failed attempt by the state of Tennessee to execute her on Wednesday.

In the court filing, Pike’s attorneys said 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.

They also wrote that instead of “remedying this failure” the execution team proceeded 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 also said. “We ask that the public and the media respect that privacy as well.”

Pike’s attorneys on Friday asked a state court to order Tennessee’s department of correction to preserve all evidence from her failed execution.

“Preserving this evidence is essential to understanding what happened, ensuring accountability and protecting Christa’s legal rights,” her attorneys’ statement said.

Pike, 50, was sentenced to death in 1996 at the age of 20 in connection with the 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer. Pike and her then boyfriend, Tadaryl Shipp, killed Slemmer at a job training camp in Knoxville, Tennessee.

One grim detail about the case is that a pentagram had been carved into Slemmer’s chest.

After the killing, Pike was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder, her attorneys said.

“It took me numerous years to even realize the gravity of what I’d done,” Pike had said in an earlier petition for clemency. “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.”

According to the Death Penalty Information Center, the last execution of a woman in Tennessee was in 1820, meaning Pike would have been the first woman to be executed in the state in more than 200 years.

Tennessee’s failed attempt to execute Pike has prompted top lawyers, doctors and members of the faith community to call for a moratorium on the death penalty in the US.

The state’s governor, Bill Lee, has ordered a third-party investigation into Pike’s botched execution. He has also paused executions in Tennessee.

Copyright for this text belongs to The Guardian.