Trump weighs in on Christa Pike's botched execution as new details emerge
Donald Trump has reacted to Christa Pike’s botched execution, saying that it ‘shouldn’t be very difficult’ to execute someone via lethal injection.
For those who are unfamiliar with the case, Pike, 50, who was sentenced to death for the brutal 1995 murder of Colleen Slemmer, was taken to a hospital on Wednesday night (30 September), after surviving a double dose of the drug Tennessee uses to execute prisoners.
She was due to be executed at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville on Wednesday (30 September), more than three decades after she committed her crime; however, it was unsuccessful, and attendees claimed they continued to hear Pike snoring from inside the chamber.
As reported by LBC, reports have claimed that as many as seven needles were used for the lethal injection, including one which bent while being removed from her arm.
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The latest update is that she was in critical condition on Thursday (1 October) and receiving ‘lifesaving care’ at a hospital.
Her lawyer Randy Spivey said during a news conference: “We don’t have a sense of her prognosis or much update on her health at the moment. But we know she is alive right now.”
READ MORE: Full timeline of Christa Pike’s case following botched execution
On the same day, the US President issued his first comments on the botched execution, after landing in Texas on Air Force One.
As reported by USA Today, the Republican leader was asked by a journalist: “After the botched execution last night in Tennessee, are you going to be pushing for any changes for capital punishment?”
Trump responded: “Well, that was an interesting situation, but you’re going to have to speak to Tennessee about it, whether or not they’re going to go forward.”
At the time, he was standing next to US Representative Ronny Jackson, who is also the former White House physician.
Trump asked him: "You know what that was about? An execution where the medication didn’t exactly work. He would answer it better than anybody. How does that happen?"
Jackson replied: "I don't know how that happens. It should be easy to do,” to which Trump agreed: "It shouldn't be very difficult.”
The failed execution led Republican governor Bill Lee to order a review, calling what happened ‘deeply disturbing’ and indefinitely postponing Pike’s execution and another one that had been scheduled for this year.
Another of Pike’s lawyers, Steve Ferrell, said she feared there would be complications because of a lifelong blood disorder that made it tough to get needles into her veins.
He said: “Throughout her life, she’s explained to us that she had trouble having blood drawn.”
It also came after an appeals court had stopped her execution an hour before it was scheduled to begin on Wednesday morning, but the US Supreme Court overturned that stay hours later.
In 1996, Pike was sentenced to death after she and her then-boyfriend, Tadaryl Shipp, who was 17 at the time, were convicted of stabbing and beating 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer, their classmate at a job training facility in Knoxville.
Slemmer was stabbed and bludgeoned, her skull was smashed, and a pentagram was reportedly carved in her chest.
Shipp was ineligible for a death sentence due to his age, so he received a life sentence and is now eligible for parole, with Shadolla Peterson, who kept lookout, pleaded guilty to being an accessory after the fact, testified against the couple, and received six years' probation.
Topics: Donald Trump, US News, Crime, News, True Crime
Madison Burgess