Updated ,first published
Death row inmate Christa Pike was believed to be “brain-dead” and hours from having her life support switched off when she woke up unexpectedly and asked where she was, her lawyers said, as a court ordered Tennessee to preserve all material related to her botched execution.
Randy Spivey, her attorney, said the convicted murderer was “angry and confused”, and had massively swollen hands, a blood clot in one arm and pneumonia. She was also unable to swallow and had not eaten.
Pike, 50, survived two supposedly fatal injections in Tennessee last week, 30 years after she was sentenced to death for brutally torturing and murdering her classmate Colleen Slemmer in 1995, when she was 18.
The case has shocked the world and raised significant questions about the death penalty in the US – along with uncertainty about whether the state of Tennessee will try to execute her again.
A court on Wednesday (US time) ordered the state to preserve and maintain all medical equipment, records and communications relating to the failed execution – with further decisions to come about Pike’s access to a tablet, and whether she should be unshackled from the bed.
Speaking to reporters after the court hearing, Spivey revealed Pike had been unresponsive and presumed brain-dead the night before she suddenly regained consciousness and began talking.
“On Monday night, it was our understanding that Christa was brain-dead and that life support would be removed the next day,” he said.
“But on Tuesday, to the shock of everyone – including me, including her team, and including the medical team – Christa woke up and began talking.”
Spivey was not in the room when Pike woke up. “Our understanding is the first thing she said was, ‘Where am I and who are you?’,” he said.
“She has wanted to know what has happened, and she has asked about several people – she has asked about her team, she has asked about the victim’s family.”
Pike was aware of the attempted execution, though was suffering a lot of “cognitive confusion”, Spivey said. “I think she is angry and confused about everything right now.”
The attorney said his client faced a long road to recovery. She could not move either of her arms, and doctors did not know if they would regain function.
“The swelling is what I noticed. Her hands looked like if you were to blow up a surgical glove. The swelling was extraordinary … That’s probably as far as I can go.”
Tennessee has temporarily paused executions following the botched attempt to kill Pike. The state has not said whether it would attempt to seek her execution again, though Spivey described the idea as “unimaginable”.
Pike’s case is unprecedented, according to the Death Penalty Information Centre, a nonprofit organisation that critiques problems with the implementation of capital punishment.
Although seven Americans previously survived execution attempts, no drugs were administered in those cases, the centre said.
The Pike case is Tennessee’s second failed execution in less than five months, after it abandoned the execution of convicted murderer Tony Carruthers in May. In that case, officials could not establish a proper IV line.
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Michael Koziol is the North America correspondent for The Age and Sydney Morning Herald. He is a former Sydney editor, Sun-Herald deputy editor and a federal political reporter in Canberra.Connect via X or email.From our partners
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