Convicted murderer Christa Pike was hospitalised on Thursday after surviving two lethal injections during her execution in Tennessee. Witnesses said she was "very clearly alive and snoring" after the blinds of the execution chamber closed for the final time.
Two failed injections
Pike, 50, was set to become the first woman to be executed in Tennessee in 200 years on Wednesday. However, she survived not one lethal injection, but two. The Tennessee Department of Correction said it "followed every step of the state's lawful, established execution protocol", adding that Pike was subsequently taken to an "off-site medical facility" after the blunder.
Pike's lawyers said she was taken to a local hospital but haven't been informed of her condition. They said in a statement: "Tonight the State of Tennessee once again failed to carry out a lawful execution."
Witness accounts
Kim Chandler, a media witness with Associated Press, told CBS News that Pike "appeared notably awake as the execution began". Pike "could be heard loudly snoring, clearly very alive in the chamber until media witnesses were told to leave the area" after the blinds of the execution chamber closed for the final time, Chandler said.
Robin Maher, the executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, told the New York Times: "This event is the worst we've seen and unlike any other botched execution in the modern era. There is no precedent."
Background and aftermath
Pike was 18 when she and her boyfriend beat and killed Colleen Slemmer, 19, at a job training camp for young people. Slemmer's body was found with a pentagram carved in her chest. The case gained national attention.
The US Supreme Court ruled that the execution could proceed. The judges wrote: "The Court's decision... unnecessarily prevents that (lower) court from giving due consideration to Pike's claim. Worse, the Court grants such extraordinary relief solely to allow the State to execute Pike before litigation over her conviction has properly run its course in the lower courts."
Pike's lawyers argued that she was mentally ill when the murder took place. They tried to get her clemency due to her young age and mental health issues at the time. "She was 18 when she committed her crime, and she was deeply mentally ill," they wrote in a clemency petition to Tennessee Governor Bill Lee. No intervention was made.
Independent UN rights experts have urged the US government and Tennessee authorities to "immediately halt" the execution and commute her death sentence, reports AFP.
Governor Bill Lee has called for a "comprehensive, third-party review" into the failed execution. He said: "The remaining scheduled execution will not be carried out this year." This refers to the execution of convicted killer Gary Wayne Sutton, which was scheduled for December 3. Tennessee also halted the execution by lethal injection of Tony Carruthers back in May after medical staff were unable to tap a vein.
Only 18 women in the US have been executed since 1976, according to the Death Penalty Information Centre.
