USA: Tennessee's failed execution of Christa Pike is torture by another name – her sentence must be commuted and all scheduled executions halted
5 October 2026
Capital Punishment Justice Project (CPJP), the Julian Wagner Memorial Fund (JWMF) and Australians Against Capital Punishment (AACP) condemn in the strongest terms the State of Tennessee's botched attempt to execute Christa Pike on 30 September 2026, and call on Governor Bill Lee to commute Ms Pike's sentence to life imprisonment and to cease all planned executions in the state.
Ms Pike, 50, was sentenced to death for a murder committed when she was just 18. Her co-accused Tadaryl Shipp was ineligible to be sentenced to death as he was 17 at the time of offending. Christa Pike’s sentencing jury never heard evidence of the child sexual abuse and rape she had suffered. Hours before her execution, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals granted a stay to consider whether her case should be reopened, given Tennessee's concession that she "was a teenaged survivor of child sexual abuse and rape who was struggling with unmedicated bipolar disorder and PTSD at the time of her crime." The US Supreme Court lifted the stay that evening. Justices Sotomayor, Kagan and Jackson dissented, Justice Sotomayor seeing "no reason to short-circuit the ordinary process of appellate review, particularly in light of the grave consequences of an erroneous decision."
She was to be the first woman executed by Tennessee in more than two centuries.
According to an emergency motion filed by her lawyers in the Davidson County Chancery Court on 2 October 2026, the execution team made at least seven attempts to establish intravenous access, bending one needle to a 90 degree in the process, before administering two full sets of pentobarbital syringes – two lethal doses. Ms Pike remained breathing for more than an hour before the attempted execution was abandoned and she was rushed to hospital, where she remains unconscious, intubated and in a critical condition, with both arms swollen, burned and blistered from the drugs that were administered. Ms Pike's lawyers had warned the courts for months that her blood condition (thrombocytosis), small veins and history of difficult needle insertion would make IV access difficult, increasing the prospect of a prolonged and painful execution.
Richard Bourke, Australian barrister, CPJP Ambassador and a death penalty defence lawyer in the United States for more than two decades, told SBS News that once the second dose failed, the protocol required the execution to cease: "And so at that point, ironically enough, they have to stop the execution attempt, provide life-saving treatment, and rush Ms Pike to a hospital where she's still held with a very uncertain prognosis." Mr Bourke also explained that under United States law a person cannot be executed unless they are mentally competent to understand that they are about to be put to death. If Ms Pike does not regain consciousness, or has suffered brain damage of a kind that impairs that understanding, the State may be constitutionally barred from attempting to execute her again.
Ms Pike is reportedly the seventh person in the United States to survive a lethal injection, but the first to survive after the full doses of drugs were actually administered.
Tennessee's Corrections Commissioner, Frank Strada, has resigned, while maintaining that the state "carried out its responsibilities in accordance with the established protocol". If that is so, the protocol itself is incapable of being carried out humanely. This is Tennessee's second failed execution this year, following the attempted execution of Tony Carruthers in May. Governor Lee has described the events as a tragedy, suspended executions for the remainder of 2026 and ordered a third-party review. That is not enough. A state that has tried and failed to kill a woman, leaving her gravely injured in intensive care, cannot credibly claim the moral or legal authority to try again – against her, or against anyone else.
CPJP, JWMF and AACP call on Governor Lee to:
commute Christa Pike's death sentence immediately and consider a sentencing alternative that reflects her current medical needs and capacity, and the mitigation evidence, including her experience as a survivor of sexual violence, parity with her co-accused, and her young age at the time of offending;
cease all planned executions in Tennessee, not merely for the remainder of this year; and
ensure the third-party review is genuinely independent, public, and extends to the sourcing and quality of the drugs used and the training of those who administer them.
What happened to Christa Pike is the predictable consequence of a punishment that cannot be administered without cruelty. It is why Australia abolished the death penalty, and why our organisations will continue to work for its abolition everywhere.
Support our work
CPJP provides direct assistance to people facing the death penalty and develops legal and policy solutions that save lives. To support this work, donate at www.cpjp.org.au/donate.
Join us to mark World Day Against the Death Penalty and hear more about the death penalty in the USA from Richard Bourke, Barrister and CPJP Ambassador on Wednesday 14 October in Melbourne: https://www.cpjp.org.au/events/world-day-against-the-death-penalty.
Media enquiries
Capital Punishment Justice Project – executive.officer@cpjp.org.au | 0434 306 210