Christa Pike remains hospitalized on a ventilator five days after Tennessee failed to execute her, and her lawyer said Sunday she has not regained consciousness. The state gave the 50-year-old two doses of pentobarbital on the night of Sept. 30 at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville, then took her to a hospital.
Fox News reported that Assistant Federal Defender Stephen Ferrell said on CNN he does not believe Pike has been conscious since the attempt. Doctors have been trying to clear the drug from her system. Ferrell said it may be days before anyone knows whether she can recover, and that a person holding her medical power of attorney is protecting her privacy. Her attorneys have said they believe the IV lines were misplaced, that veins blew, and that the drug entered her tissue instead of her bloodstream. Witnesses said she was still alive and snoring after the second dose.
Reuters reported that Pike was unconscious, intubated and in critical condition as of Friday, with significant injuries to both arms. In an emergency filing in Davidson County Chancery Court, her lawyers wrote that the execution team used at least seven needles, that one needle was bent at a 90-degree angle, and that at no point did the team realize the lines were not correctly placed. The filing said both of her arms were swollen, burned and blistered when she arrived at a Nashville-area hospital. Lawyers asked the court to order the Tennessee Department of Correction to preserve evidence.
Gov. Bill Lee called the attempt deeply disturbing, halted executions for the rest of 2026 and ordered an independent review. The Tennessean reported that Correction Commissioner Frank Strada will resign later this month. Strada said the department followed protocol and that stepping down is in the best interest of Tennesseans while the review proceeds. Lee thanked him and accepted the resignation. It was the second failed execution attempt in Tennessee this year. In May, the state stopped the execution of Tony Carruthers after staff could not set a second IV line. Lee also canceled the Dec. 3 execution of Gary Wayne Sutton.
Pike was 18 in 1995 when she and her boyfriend tortured and killed classmate Colleen Slemmer in Knoxville. She was set to be the first woman executed in Tennessee in more than 200 years. A federal appeals court briefly paused the execution, and the U.S. Supreme Court later allowed it to proceed after a nine-hour delay. Lee declined to commute her sentence to life. Her lawyers have again asked him to do that if she recovers.
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