Tennessee Governor Bill Lee has suspended all executions in the state until at least the end of the year after officials failed to execute death row prisoner Christa Pike.
The decision follows an unusual incident in which Pike remained alive and reportedly snoring about 40 minutes after receiving two doses of the lethal drug pentobarbital.Lee described the failed execution as “deeply disturbing” and ordered an independent investigation into what went wrong.
Speaking to reporters on Thursday, the governor said there were many questions that needed to be answered and expressed disappointment over the incident.Pike, 50, was convicted and sentenced to death for the 1994 murder of a teenage classmate.
Her execution would have made her the first woman executed in Tennessee in more than two centuries. She was taken to an outside medical facility after the execution attempt, although officials had not provided an update on her condition.The execution had already faced legal challenges.
The US Supreme Court intervened late Wednesday to allow the execution to proceed after a federal court had issued a temporary stay to consider claims that Pike’s history of childhood sexual abuse had not been fully considered during her sentencing.Pike’s lawyers later asked the Tennessee Supreme Court to halt the execution, arguing that she was suffering unnecessary pain and that the state was violating her constitutional protection against cruel and unusual punishment.
They also raised concerns about difficulties accessing her veins and the condition of the pentobarbital used.The incident has renewed questions about Tennessee’s execution procedures. In May, officials called off the planned lethal injection of another death row prisoner, Tony Carruthers, after reportedly spending more than an hour trying to establish an intravenous line.
The Death Penalty Information Center described Pike’s case as an unprecedented botched execution attempt. Governor Lee said an independent investigator would be appointed to conduct a comprehensive review, while Tennessee’s execution schedule remains suspended pending the investigation.
