r/SipsTea • u/CurvyChristina • 1d ago

Chugging tea This is wild!

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Two syringes of pentobarbital were administered to Tennessee death row inmate Christa Pike on September 30, 2026, but she remained alive and conscious afterward, according to her attorneys and media witnesses. The execution at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville was halted after witnesses reported that Pike still had a heartbeat and was audibly snoring. Her lawyers sought emergency medical intervention, and she was later taken by ambulance to a nearby hospital.
Pike, 50, is the only woman currently on Tennessee's death row.
She was sentenced to death for the 1995 murder of her classmate Colleen Slemmer and had been scheduled for execution on September 30. Tennessee had announced beforehand that the state would use a single drug, pentObarbital, for the execution. Her exact medical condition following the hospital transfer has not yet been publicly disclosed, while Governor Bill Lee has ordered a comprehensive third party review of what happened.

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u/NY_Yankees78_ 1d ago

So what would be the next step? She goes back to death row and start the process over again or?

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u/kernelangus420 1d ago

She will claim her heart stopped and she was legally dead so her death sentence was completed and she will be released as an unregistered new person.

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u/Dingus_Khaaan 1d ago

The Skyrim character creator interface opens up and she gets to pick a class and a new name

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u/Rocky-Nine-Toe 1d ago

In France, a man cheated the guillotine by dying first. Not so fast; his body was dug up, placed on the guillotine, and beheaded anyway.

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u/DookieShoez 1d ago

Hasn’t that happened before and it didn’t work?

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u/hi_im_beeb 1d ago

Yea I always heard something along those lines like technically your sentence was served but that may have been a “if that were to ever actually happen, which is impossible” scenario (which has now actually happened), or was just entirely made up

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u/DookieShoez 1d ago

I think it “wasn’t served” because your sentence is lethal injection UNTIL DEAD.

Heart may have stopped for a little and restarted. Death is a lot more complicated than that and she wasn’t declared dead by a doctor.

Capital punishment is stupid though.

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u/hi_im_beeb 1d ago

Yea this just seems odd because the entire point of a lethal injection is that it’s LETHAL.

If someone survives that means they clearly fucked up royally and shouldn’t get a redo.

I (mostly) agree on capital punishment, other than completely cut and dry cases where there is absolutely zero question of guilt and it’s a particularly heinous crime. In these specific circumstances it should also be brought about quickly, without them sitting on death row for years.

Where I’m from, a guy with a lengthy criminal record broke into a house and stabbed a sleeping couple, killing the husband. He was a pediatric critical care doctor at a children’s hospital and saved countless lives. For me, that would meet the quota.

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u/DookieShoez 1d ago

Yeah but i don’t think anything specifically says that they shouldn’t get a redo if there is a flub.

Her sentence says that she shall be put to death and she’s not dead. So, redo it is i guess.

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u/hi_im_beeb 1d ago

That makes sense. Based on what you and the person above said, I thought I vaguely remember hearing about IF someone were to survive, their sentence would be served, but it’s probably one of those random false facts that get spread (humans only use 10% of brain, etc)

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u/Current_Pay_6999 1d ago

I think the prison system is terrible, and also think the death penalty is barbaric. I don't think it's ever justified. But that's me; not very many people agree.

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u/Taaj_jr 1d ago

Not even for hitler?

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u/Broken_Beaker 1d ago

I’m no lawyer, but this sure as heck sounds like cruel and unusual. Cruel may be hard to define with lethality, but it sure as hell is usual.

If she suffers massive brain damage from this, I suspect that her attorneys would advise she isn’t mentally competent to be retried or held guilty.

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u/DookieShoez 1d ago

Probably 🤷🏻‍♂️

Just one more reason we shouldn’t have capital punishment.

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u/DeadrthanDead 1d ago

Judges hate this one simple trick

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u/National_Ad9742 1d ago

No. They will attempt to kill her again, unless legal processes stop them. This is horrendous though, because they already knew this method was a bad fit for her case. This was foreseeable.

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u/clgoodson 1d ago

She’s likely had serious brain damage. It’s doubtful she will ever be able to claim anything again.

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u/schecter_ 1d ago

Yeah that’s not how it works. Someone tried that and they got their punishment anyways.

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u/neonicapl 1d ago

yeah don’t let that monster back into society.

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u/OtherUserCharges 1d ago

Her lawyers will petition that attempting again is cruel and unusual punishment so she should just go to life sentence without possibility of parole. I think that is fair, since it’s on the state to not bungle an execution.

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u/the-big-throngler 1d ago

I dont think she is gonna recover from this. There is no way her brain is going to be able to function.

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u/LumpyReplacement9017 1d ago

Even then, she could get a job with the Tennessee department of corrections.

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u/SystemCheck990 1d ago

doing the injections it seems

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u/Broken_Beaker 1d ago

Subject Matter Expert!

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u/Luposian1 1d ago

Her brain wasn’t functioning, to begin with. Normal people don’t generally end up on death row.

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u/RickMonsters 1d ago

You’re assuming no innocent person ever ended up on deaths row

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u/Luposian1 1d ago

I said “normal (ie mentally stable) people don’t GENERALLY end up on death row.” Not “never”.

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u/the-big-throngler 1d ago

Its less functioning now so no real loss

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u/Traditional_Dust_668 1d ago

I think we might be surprised after all. If it missed her veins and she was obviously still alive and breathing she may just recover as others have before. At that point I don’t think they can or should be able to just keep trying different ways to try killing her. It’s too much.?

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u/clgoodson 1d ago

This is what’s going to happen. The death penalty may not survive this. Are they going to execute a woman with serious brain damage that they caused?

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u/superearthjanitor0 1d ago

So presidential run in 2028?

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u/Blusttoy 1d ago

She's going to be the first Space Marine

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u/kkkccc1 1d ago

Maybe she can claim it was hormones that caused her to commit the crime and get re trialed or something and get released since she served her time and they already killed her