Trump has used the full might of the presidency to supercharge executions, but an avalanche of mishaps has put the system’s flaws in the spotlight

It took more than an hour to establish the two intravenous lines through which Christa Pike would be injected with a giant and normally lethal dose of the sedative pentobarbital, and in that time she did everything she could to assist those who were attempting to kill her.

“Please try here,” she said over and over again to Tennessee’s execution team, pointing to specific parts of her body where she thought they might find a vein as they repeatedly stabbed her with needles. “Please try here, I think it will be OK. Please try up on my shoulder, higher.”

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© Illustration: Guardian Design/AP Photo/The Tennessean/Lisa Nipp

© Illustration: Guardian Design/AP Photo/The Tennessean/Lisa Nipp

© Illustration: Guardian Design/AP Photo/The Tennessean/Lisa Nipp

Pike’s lawyers said she is back in same prison she’s lived in for last 30 years and will continue to receive medical care

Christa Pike has been discharged from the hospital after surviving Tennessee’s botched 30 September attempt to execute her by lethal injection and is back in prison, her lawyers said on Saturday.

Pike, 50, returned to the Deborah K Johnson rehabilitation center, where she has been imprisoned for the last three decades, her attorneys, Stephen Ferrell, Luke Ihnen, Randy Spivey and Kelly Gleason, said in a statement.

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© Photograph: WBIR-TV/AP

© Photograph: WBIR-TV/AP

© Photograph: WBIR-TV/AP

The world may be going to hell in a handcart, but at least now I get to say I know a Nobel prize winner

“Anyone worried about pneumonic plague?” This is a friend – a medic – texting me after reading reports at the weekend of the 28-year-old Russian woman who died while working at a “plague research lab” in Siberia. Relying on details from the famously open Russian state guaranteed the presence of a certain dark subtext to the tantalisingly short news item. Namely: lab-grown disease cultivated for reasons unknown and with a 100% mortality rate escapes Russian facility into general population, eight hours’ flying time from London. In other words, we’re all going to die.

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© Photograph: TT News Agency/Alamy Stock Photo/Alamy Live News.

© Photograph: TT News Agency/Alamy Stock Photo/Alamy Live News.

© Photograph: TT News Agency/Alamy Stock Photo/Alamy Live News.

Recovery marks a dramatic turnaround for Pike, who remains in hospital after a botched execution in Tennessee

Christa Pike is “up and walking” in hospital, her lawyer said, just more than a week after she survived two lethal injections during a botched execution in Tennessee.

The recovery marks a dramatic turnaround after Pike was declared brain dead on Monday, before waking up and beginning to speak on Tuesday. Her ordeal has shocked many in the US and overseas and galvanized critics of the death penalty.

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© Photograph: J Miles Cary/Reuters

© Photograph: J Miles Cary/Reuters

© Photograph: J Miles Cary/Reuters

Christa Pike, a death row inmate who survived the state of Tennessee’s attempt to execute her last week, is conscious and speaking. The 50-year-old is recovering in hospital after surviving two lethal injections in a case that has shocked many in the US and prompted a debate about the death penalty. She was due to be the first woman executed in Tennessee in more than 200 years. Michael Safi speaks to the chief reporter for Guardian US, Ed Pilkington – watch on YouTube

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© Photograph: Reuters

© Photograph: Reuters

© Photograph: Reuters

A catheter carrying the drug may not have delivered the doses to Ms. Pike’s bloodstream, experts said. The drug itself may have been degraded.

© George Walker IV/Associated Press

On Wednesday night, Tennessee attempted to execute 50-year-old Christa Pike, set to be the state's first female execution in over 200 years for a murder she committed at age 18. However, after executioners administered two full doses of lethal injection drugs, Pike remained alive, thrashed her feet, complained of pain, and made loud snoring sounds behind closed curtains until the execution window expired and she was rushed to an off-site hospital. The victim's mother described the scene simply as "a mess." Pike's defense team had filed petitions before the execution requesting an alternative method: execution by an all-female firing squad. The botched attempt is the latest in a growing series of failed lethal injections across the US, raising renewed questions about state protocols, medical competency, and Eighth Amendment limits.

Lethal injections are increasingly prone to failure across the United States over the last decade, driven largely by pharmaceutical companies blocking the use of their products in executions and states relying on poorly trained staff or untested drug cocktails:

• Thomas Creech (Idaho, 2024): Executioners called off Creech's execution after attempting to establish an IV line in his arms and legs eight separate times over nearly an hour without success.
• Joe Nathan James Jr. (Alabama, 2022): Took over three hours to execute after correctional staff struggled continuously to establish IV access, marking the longest known completed execution in modern U.S. history.
• Kenneth Eugene Smith (Alabama, 2022): Survived an aborted four-hour lethal injection attempt in November 2022 due to collapsed veins; Alabama subsequently executed him in January 2024 using nitrogen gas.
• Alan Eugene Miller (Alabama, 2022): Had his lethal injection called off after executioners poked him for hours attempting to find a vein before his warrant expired; Alabama later executed him via nitrogen gas in September 2024.
• John Marion Grant (Oklahoma, 2021): Suffered severe convulsions and repeated vomiting during his execution after receiving midazolam—with autopsies indicating he suffered flash pulmonary edema while conscious—before ultimately dying on the gurney.
• Clayton Lockett (Oklahoma, 2014): Suffered a failed groin IV insertion that caused execution drugs to leak into surrounding tissue, causing him to regain consciousness and writhe before dying of a heart attack 45 minutes later.