Christa Pike remained alive and was rushed to a hospital after Tennessee prison officials failed to complete her execution on Wednesday night. Witnesses reported the 50 year old inmate was still awake and snoring more than 40 minutes after officials administered 2 doses of pentobarbital. In response to the botched attempt, Governor Bill Lee ordered a suspension of all executions in the state for the remainder of 2026.

Pike was convicted as an 18 year old in the 1995 murder of classmate Colleen Slemmer, a crime in which she reportedly kept a piece of the victim's skull as a souvenir. The US Supreme Court had cleared the state to proceed with the execution on Sept. 30 by vacating a Sixth Circuit stay that sought to review Pike's history of sexual abuse, a decision Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissented from. Had the lethal injection succeeded, Pike would have been the first woman the state executed in more than 200 years.