Christa Pike on Ventilator After Failed Execution Attempt, Lawyers Report

Christa Pike, a Tennessee woman, has been placed on a ventilator and intubated following a failed execution attempt, according to a court filing from her legal team. The filing states that Pike remains critically ill and unconscious while receiving treatment at a hospital in Nashville. Medical staff are reportedly working to clear doses of the drug pentobarbital from her system, which is used in executions. Her lawyers noted that upon arrival at the hospital, both of Pike's arms were swollen, burned, and blistered due to the drug's effects. The filing is part of an emergency request by her lawyers to preserve state records related to her execution and provides a detailed update on her condition after she was transported by ambulance from a Tennessee prison on Wednesday. The lawyers argue that issues with the IV lines caused the pentobarbital to improperly enter her body. They stated, "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." Furthermore, they allege that prison staff prepared a backup set of syringes and administered another lethal dose of pentobarbital. Pike, who was sentenced to death at 18 for the 1995 torture and murder of another young woman, would have been the first woman executed in Tennessee in over 200 years and was the only woman on the state’s death row. Her lawyers have called for her sentence to be commuted to life in prison, describing the execution attempt as "chemical torture." In response to the incident, Tennessee Governor Bill Lee has suspended all executions for the remainder of the year while an investigation is conducted.