Christa Pike remains unconscious and on a ventilator in a Nashville hospital, five days after her failed execution in Tennessee. On being asked if she ever regained consciousness after the execution attempt, Assistant Federal Defender Stephen Ferrell, Pike’s lawyer, said on CNN’s State of the Union, “Not that I am aware of.”
Pike remains on a ventilator with hospital staff working to save her life and clear the pentobarbital she was administered from her system, her attorneys said, according to The Guardian. She received two doses of the drug in a failed attempt by the state of Tennessee to execute her on Wednesday, September 31.
What’s next for Christa Pike?
Knoxville attorney T. Scott Jones, senior partner at Banks and Jones Attorneys, said that the first step now is to determine whether Pike has any brain activity.
“Well, I think the next step is to check and see what her mental condition is,” Jones said, per WVLT. “We’ve had a lot of concern that her body is still alive, but whether or not there is brain activity associated with the same. And that’s going to bring up the point with regards to competence. Because we have a Supreme Court decision that indicates that you cannot put someone to death if, in fact, they are not competent.”
Jones added that litigation is expected to proceed in both state and federal court.
“From a litigation standpoint, I suspect that we will start back through the state courts and the federal courts relative to this competence issue as to whether or not she, even if she does survive, at what cognitive state is she going to be?” Jones said. “So, we’re going to see both the state of Tennessee as well as her attorneys litigate that issue.”
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“And if, in fact, she is incompetent, the case law is pretty clear and it says that you can’t put her to death,” Jones continued.
“They will likely pursue stuff on a dual avenue approach, both through the federal court system and the state court system,” Jones added. “I mean, at some point in time, the courts are going to have to make that decision with regards to her competence and also to whether or not that under the Eighth Amendment, this basically constitutes cruel and inhumane punishment.”
Jones then went on to reference Ford v. Wainwright, a case he said the U.S. Supreme Court decided in 1986.
“And in this particular circumstance, even if she recovers, she may have suffered significant brain damage such that she may not be able to comprehend, much like a young child, what is physically being done to her,” Jones said. “And so, that was the purpose of basically the Ford v. Rainwright case that the United States Supreme Court, I believe, decided in 1986, dealing with the fact that you had to have someone be able to appreciate the punishment that they are receiving in order for it to be effectuated upon them.”
Even if Pike does recover, the state will have to start over as her death warrant has recovered.
Jones said that it would not survive him if the governor decided to commute her sentence to life without parole.
“I mean, it is a lot of unanswered questions and it is a terrible black eye for the state of Tennessee,” Jones said. “I mean, it appears that we may have to really go back and examine all of our protocols. I know the Department of Corrections head, I believe, has resigned as a result of this.”
Jones then compared the situation to other execution methods.
“Much like if someone was going to be executed by a firing squad, if you’re going to shoot somebody, hit them,” Jones said. “Don’t miss. If you are going to electrocute them, so to speak, let’s make sure we’ve got full power going to Old Sparky. And if you were going to actually inject them with a dose of drugs such to paralyze their body, render them unconscious, and put them to death, make sure that you do it competently.”
Pike, 50, was sentenced to death in 1996 in connection with the 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer. Pike was 20 at the time.
Pike and her then boyfriend, Tadaryl Shippmurdered Slemmer at a job training camp in Knoxville, Tennessee. Shocking details about the case shocked the United States, including the fact that a pentagram had been carved into Slemmer’s chest.
The Death Penalty Information Center states that the last execution of a woman in Tennessee was in 1820. This means Pike would have been the first woman to be executed in the state in more than 200 years.