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Doctor in Christa Pike execution tied to earlier botched lethal injection
Doctor in Christa Pike execution tied to earlier botched lethal injection
Doctor in Christa Pike execution tied to earlier botched lethal injection

Published on: 10/01/2026

Description

NASHVILLE, TENN. (WSMV/WVLT/Gray News) - The doctor who oversaw Christa Gail Pike’s lethal injection was also involved in another botched execution earlier this year.

Pike was still alive after being administered a lethal injection, according to Luke Ihnen, an assistant federal defender on her defense team.

Ihnen confirmed that Pike had received two syringes of a lethal drug and said the team is filing a motion to stay the execution.

According to the motion, Pike did not lose consciousness and still had a heartbeat after receiving the lethal injection. It was reported that she was also audibly snoring.

The motion mentioned that the curtains went down twice.

Pike’s defense team had argued during a three-day hearing in August that she had a vein condition, which would make finding a vein to administer the lethal drug difficult.

Mark Fowler, the doctor who oversaw Pike’s botched execution, was also involved in the attempted execution of Tony Carruthers. His execution was abandoned in May after medical staff failed to establish IV access, a process that took more than an hour.

Tony Carruthers was not executed on Thursday morning.
Tony Carruthers was not executed on Thursday morning.(Tennessee Department of Correction via AP)

The petition filed by Pike’s attorneys is requesting an immediate stay of Pike’s execution and immediate medical care for her.

Her attorneys released a statement late Wednesday night that said Pike is being treated at a nearby hospital.

“Tonight the State of Tennessee once again failed to carry out a lawful execution,” they said. “We take no pleasure in being right, but the concerns raised by Ms. Pike proved to be true: difficult vein access, blown veins, degraded pentobarbital, no emergency medical care available when things inevitably go wrong, all under a protocol that remains veiled in secrecy.”

As of Wednesday night, they said they had not been informed about her condition.

Less than an hour before Pike was originally supposed to be executed at 11 a.m. Wednesday, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals granted a stay pausing her execution. That prompted a response from the state, which asked the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene and allow the execution to continue.

The Supreme Court lifted the stay just before 7 p.m., which set in motion Pike’s execution.

Pike was found guilty in 1996 of the 1995 murder of 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer on the University of Tennessee campus.

Pike, along with 17-year-old Tadaryl Shipp and 18-year-old Shadolla Peterson, planned Slemmer’s torture and killing. The case later became known as the Job Corps Murder because both Pike and Slemmer were members of Job Corps at the time.

There’s no word on what the state’s next steps will be in Pike’s planned execution.

Her botched execution appears to be the latest failed attempt by the state of Tennessee to execute an inmate on death row. The state’s death penalty procedure has faced past scrutiny after botched executions prompted a pause from Gov. Bill Lee.

That said, Tennessee did successfully execute an inmate in August. Anthony Darrell Hines was executed at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville for the 1985 murder of Catherine Jean Jackson Jenkins.

Copyright 2026 WSMV/WVLT via Gray Local Media, Inc. All rights reserved.

News Source : https://www.walb.com/2026/10/01/doctor-christa-pike-execution-tied-earlier-botched-lethal-injection/

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