U.S. Supreme Court-Sanctioned Murder

"The case of Christa Pike lays bare multiple reasons why the death penalty should be abolished."

"The prolonged suffering -- physical and mental -- arising from multiple failed execution attempts is abhorrent and cruel."

"And there are key fair trial questions still unresolved." 

UN rights chief Volker Turk

 

"Pike appeared notably awake as the execution began [at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution]."

"A couple of times she looked around the room. At one point she looked toward prison officials and asked if it was supposed to feel that way."

"[She was] loudly snoring, clearly very much alive [as the journalists were ushered out of the area]." 

Kim Chandler, journalist media witness, The Associated Press 

 

"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."

"[Rather than] remedying this failure, [the execution team proceeded to prepare and administer a backup set of pentobarbital syringes]."

"[She is now] critically ill and … receiving medical care for the devastating effects of Wednesday night's 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. We ask that the public and the media respect that privacy as well."

"Preserving this evidence is essential to understanding what happened, ensuring accountability and protecting Christa’s legal rights."

Christa Pike's attorneys  

Undated photo of Christa Pike provided by the Tennessee Department of Correction.

Tennessee Department of Correction via AP

 

In Tennessee this past Wednesday, 50-year-old Christa Pike, who has been on death row for 30 years after being convicted at age 20 of murdering a 19-year-old girlfriend whom she accused of trying to steal her boyfriend's affections, was given two lethal injections in the state's follow-through of capital punishment, both of which failed. The woman somehow managed to survive the two deadly doses of pentobarbital, but barely. She was comatose, unresponsive and clearly close to death, but not yet expired.

 

"This event is the worst we've seen and unlike any other botched execution in the modern era", stated the executive director of the Death Penalty Information Centre. "There is no precedent", said Robin Maher. Days after the horrendous malfunction, The Tennessee Department of Correction Commissioner announced his decision to resign.

In 1995, when the murder took place at a job training camp in Knoxville Tennessee, then-20-year-old Pike had been sentenced to death for the killing of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer. Pike's boyfriend, Tadarvl Shipp, was also involved in the murder. During that time, Pike had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder. "It took me numerous years to even realize the gravity of what I’d done. 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", she said in a later petition for clemency.

The Tennessee Department of Corrections must be living in the Dark Ages. In this century, individuals who have committed grave crimes of murder who are found to be bipolar and suffering from mental health crises to which their psychosis is attached, are considered to be 'not criminally responsible'. Even if she had been, at age 20 considered fully mentally intact and responsible for the horror of murdering another person, a prison term of 30 years, with a death sentence attached to it must be considered cruel and unusual punishment. Mass murderers get away with less.

 

The woman's lawyers had argued against the execution, and despite their intervention, the barbaric ritual proceeded. What it resulted in was "difficult vein access, blown veins, degraded pentobarbital, no emergency medical care available when things inevitably go wrong, all under a protocol that remains veiled in secrecy". In the 21st Century. In the United States of America.

 

During the procedure, assembled witnesses watched in fascinated horror as the woman was prepared for death, as the attendants proceeded to inject the fatal chemical, and ... nothing happened. And so they tried again, re-preparing the syringes to inject more of the lethal pentobarbital ... and again the expectation that the prisoner condemned to death would cooperate and expire ... but she did not. "We just listened ... to her snoring and making very loud breathing sounds for almost an hour", related Catherine Sweeney of WPLN television. 

 

Then, as the witness-journalists were ushered out, an ambulance, lights flashing, left the prison. According to the Tennessee Department of Correction it had "followed every step of the state's lawful, established execution protocol", that the newly-incapacitated Christa Pike, after languishing for 30 years in the state penal system, had been taken to an "off-site medical facility". 

 

The U.S. Supreme Court had actually and truly cleared the way forward for the State of Tennessee to proceed with its intended capital punishment in the wake of legal filings by Ms. Pike's law team. Her lawyers stated: "The resignation of Commissioner Strada is justified, but it does nothing to help Christa now. What happened to her Wednesday reflects a systemic failure that goes far beyond any one person. We hope the Governor's call for a full, independent review will expose the profound problems within Tennessee's entire death penalty system." 

 

Emergency vehicles arrive at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution after the execution of Christa Pike was halted Wednesday, Sept. 30, 2026, in Nashville, Tennessee. Photograph: George Walker IV/AP