With Christa Pike Unconscious, Another Execution Attempt Is in Doubt
New York Times · LC · trust 55/100
Her condition raises questions about whether Tennessee could attempt to execute her again if she is incapable of understanding what is happening.
Listen · 5:36 min Share full article Friday’s disclosure was the most detailed information about Christa Pike’s health since she survived two rounds of pentobarbital Wednesday evening. Credit... Denny Simmons/The Tennessean/USA TODAY NETWORK, via Reuters By Emily Cochrane
As of Thursday evening, Ms. Pike, 50, was critically ill, they wrote in the Friday filing in Davidson County Chancery Court, and both of her arms were swollen, burned and blistered when she arrived at the hospital.
Her condition sets the stage for an unprecedented ethical and legal quagmire: A future attempt to execute Ms. Pike could hinge on whether she is determined to be capable of what the Supreme Court has described as a “rational understanding” of the reason she is to be put to death.
And although Gov. Bill Lee has paused executions for now, the front-runner to be elected governor next month, Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn, said that she would try again to execute Ms. Pike, who was convicted of the 1995 murder of a classmate.
The family of the classmate, Colleen Slemmer, deserves “swift justice,” Ms. Blackburn said in a statement, in response to questions from The New York Times.
Friday’s disclosure about Ms. Pike’s condition is the most detailed update since she survived two rounds of pentobarbital , the drug used as part of Tennessee’s lethal injection protocol, on Wednesday evening. But it also underscored the legal and medical complexities that lie ahead for Ms. Pike, her lawyers, the doctors and nurses treating her, and her loved ones.
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