After failed execution: Lawyers discuss Pike's health

After the failed execution in the US state of Tennessee, lawyers have now commented in more detail about Christa Pike's health. The 50-year-old is "still very cognitively confused," said Pike's attorney Randy Spivey. There are moments when she drifts off for a while.

“Where am I and who are you?” were her first words after waking up in the hospital. However, she is aware that the state tried to execute her. Spivey said he believes Pike is "angry and confused" at the moment.

Pike was sentenced to death in 1996 for the murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer. She was 18 years old at the time of the crime. She was scheduled to be executed last week. According to authorities, she was given the two doses of the drug pentobarbital required by the execution protocol. Yet she continued to live.

Blood clot in the arm

After being put on a ventilator at a Nashville-area hospital, she regained consciousness Tuesday, according to her attorneys. She has a blood clot in one of her arms and cannot move any of her limbs. "We don't know if and to what extent she will regain function," Spivey said. “Her hands looked like a surgical glove had been inflated,” Spivey described. In addition, Pike is suffering from pneumonia and is being fed. She has a long road to recovery ahead of her.

Her lawyers expressed surprise that Pike regained consciousness a week after the botched execution. "On Monday evening we assumed that Christa was brain dead and that life support would be taken off the next day," Spivey said. Much to everyone's surprise, Pike woke up and started talking.

Evidence should be secured

The evidence from last week's attempted execution should now be secured. This would be relevant should Pike need to challenge a future execution, attorney Luke told them in court. The New York Times points out that her health will likely determine whether Pike will be tried again at a later date.

Pike's lawyers repeatedly reiterated their demand to Tennessee's Republican governor, Bill Lee, that Pike should be sentenced to life in prison instead of the death penalty - without the possibility of early release. “From what we have seen, it is inconceivable that the state would attempt to execute her again,” Spivey said.

According to the Death Penalty Information Center, there is no known comparable modern U.S. case in which the intended execution drugs were administered and the prisoner still lived. The case has brought the debate that has been going on for years about the death penalty in the USA and in particular about the reliability of executions by lethal injection back into focus.