{"id":226311,"date":"2026-10-02T12:17:18","date_gmt":"2026-10-02T12:17:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/christa-pike-is-in-critical-condition-after-failed-execution-in-tennessee-her-lawyers-say-nbc-news\/"},"modified":"2026-10-02T12:17:18","modified_gmt":"2026-10-02T12:17:18","slug":"christa-pike-is-in-critical-condition-after-failed-execution-in-tennessee-her-lawyers-say-nbc-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/christa-pike-is-in-critical-condition-after-failed-execution-in-tennessee-her-lawyers-say-nbc-news\/","title":{"rendered":"Christa Pike is in critical condition after failed execution in Tennessee, her lawyers say – NBC News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Morning Rundown: How Cornell student reacted to rape accusation, why fewer young people are getting shingles, and poison centers see uptick in \u2018cat\u2019s claw\u2019 calls<\/a><\/span><\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

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Christa Pike<\/a> shouldn\u2019t still be breathing. She survived two injections of lethal drugs in a harrowing failed execution<\/a> by the state of Tennessee, raising questions about how the procedure was carried out and how it went wrong.
Nearly 24 hours after Pike was set to be put to death for a murder she committed when she was 18, she remains alive but in a critical condition and is receiving care, her lawyers said Thursday afternoon.
Her prognosis is unclear, said Randall Spivey, one of her lawyers. Neither he nor another lawyer, Stephen Ferrell, who spoke with reporters, said he had seen her in the hospital.
\u201cI\u2019m haunted by last night,\u201d said Spivey, who was there during the execution attempt.
Spivey said he counted at least seven needles used in Pike\u2019s left arm alone, \u201cone of which appeared to be bent when it was pulled from her arm after an unsuccessful attempt.\u201d
He added that Pike\u2019s right arm had turned purple after the second round of the drug pentobarbital, a sedative used in Tennessee\u2019s execution protocol, was dispensed. Pike\u2019s lawyers said they also learned of \u201cblistering and burning around the sites of the injection.\u201d
The description sheds additional light on what occurred inside the execution chamber as the execution team tried to put Pike, 50, to death.<\/a>
After the curtain to the chamber was opened at 7:26 p.m., a media witness said, Pike complained that \u201cmy arm feels like it\u2019s about to burst open.\u201d
Other media witnesses said that Pike moaned that one spot was \u201creally throbbing\u201d and that she was kicking so often that she knocked a sheet that was laid on her.
She continued to make snoring sounds, groan and move after the drugs were presumed to have taken effect, the witnesses said.
Five minutes after the second dose, \u201cit was clear that Miss Pike was still breathing,\u201d Spivey said.
Where is Christa Pike now?
He said that he didn\u2019t see any lifesaving care being provided to Pike when he was able to witness the events but that there was a time before the witnesses were led out when no one could see what was happening. Medical care was administered in an ambulance that was called at 8:50 p.m. to the prison in Nashville where executions are held.
\u201cLast night was not just inefficient; it was cruel and it was torturous,\u201d Spivey said.
Medical experts told NBC News that Pike\u2019s injuries could be consistent with the drug\u2019s failing to go directly into her bloodstream but ending up in surrounding tissue because of incorrect insertion or leaking.
If that happened, it would mean less of the drug got into her circulatory system, keeping her breathing and moving rather than becoming deeply comatose before death, said Dr. Jonathan Groner, an emeritus professor of clinical surgery at the Ohio State University College of Medicine.
Burning around the injection site could also be evidence of the drug\u2019s not getting properly injected into a vein, he added.
\u201cI\u2019ve seen partial-thickness burns look red or purple,\u201d Groner said.
Ferrell said he thinks a \u201cnumber of factors\u201d could explain the execution failure, but he said that based on what medical experts told their team about Pike\u2019s difficult veins, it seems the intravenous line may have infiltrated.
That occurs when a misplaced needle deposits medication into the arm instead of the bloodstream. That, he said, would be consistent with Pike\u2019s complaints that her arm was hurting during the process and that it felt like it was \u201cabout to explode.\u201d
Spivey described venous issues that Pike has had throughout her life, noting problems with typical blood draws. It\u2019s part of the reason she feared this method of execution and why she requested a different method, the lawyers said.
\u201cI do know that that really was her biggest fear,\u201d Ferrell said. \u201cIt was not a fear of dying. It was a fear of a prolonged, painful, traumatic death, and that\u2019s what happened minus the death.\u201d
Spivey said that he was given an emergency number for the Tennessee Supreme Court to call if something went wrong with the execution but that when he called it, it went to voicemail.
Pike\u2019s attorneys have since appealed her execution. Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee has stayed her execution until a third-party investigation uncovers what happened Wednesday.
\u201cThis is a tragedy. There is no one that wanted what happened last night to happen. It shouldn\u2019t have happened,\u201d Lee said at a news conference Thursday morning.
He declined to give details of Pike\u2019s condition and said he would be hiring a team to look into the circumstances surrounding the failure.
Spivey said of Lee: \u201cI do hope he cares, because this is as a citizen of Tennessee. This is something that was done in all of our names.\u201d
It\u2019s the second time an execution didn\u2019t go as planned in Tennessee this year. Tony Carruthers<\/a>, convicted in three 1994 killings, was granted a one-year reprieve after executioners in May couldn\u2019t find a vein for a backup IV<\/a>.
Many questions remain in Pike\u2019s case: Was she in pain when it was occurring? Will she remember what happened? Will there be long-term damage? Ferrell said he doesn\u2019t have the answers.
\u201cWe may never know what all she was suffering through, either because she can\u2019t remember it, she can\u2019t tell it, or it overwhelms her in such a way that, you know, sometimes pain and suffering affects people that way,\u201d he added.
Pike\u2019s conviction stems from a 1995 murder case. Pike and two other teenage accomplices worked together to torture, slash and fatally beat Colleen Slemmer, Knoxville police said at the time.<\/a> Pike was convicted in Slemmer\u2019s death and sentenced to death; she was on death row for decades.
Slemmer\u2019s mother, May Martinez, who traveled to Nashville to watch the execution, told <\/a>reporters on Thursday: \u201cI didn\u2019t get justice for my daughter.\u201d
A number of last-minute legal efforts to stop Pike\u2019s execution were unsuccessful. Pike was set to be the first woman Tennessee has executed in more than 200 years.
Rebecca Cohen is a breaking news reporter for NBC News Digital.
Erik Ortiz is a senior reporter for NBC News Digital focusing on racial injustice and social inequality.
© 2026 NBCUniversal Media, LLC<\/p>\n

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