Emergency calls show delays after failed Christa Pike execution

Newly released 911 recordings show emergency services were delayed following a failed lethal injection attempt on death row inmate Christa Pike in Tennessee on September 30, Euronews, BBC News, and the Daily Express reported. Euronews, BBC News, and msnbc.com noted that the recordings were obtained by the Associated Press through a public records request. The calls reveal that minutes passed as prison officials and dispatchers questioned whether the request for emergency help was legitimate. [1][2][3][4]

According to msnbc.com, the first emergency call was released only as a written transcript from the Nashville Department of Emergency Communications, which reported that Pike was unconscious and not breathing normally. The New York Post reported that the initial call went to dispatchers at 8:40 p.m., but prison staff did not confirm the request was genuine until 9:11 p.m. Euronews reported that emergency responders were allowed into the prison about 30 minutes after the initial call. [1][2][4][5]

Euronews reported that the 50-year-old Pike received at least two doses of pentobarbital but remained alive, after which she was hospitalised and placed on a ventilator. As FTMQ News reported earlier, Pike was discharged from the hospital on Saturday and returned to prison. The Daily Express noted that Pike was set to be the first woman executed in Tennessee in over 200 years. [1][3][16][17]

In 1995, at the age of 18, Pike and her boyfriend lured 19-year-old classmate Colleen Slemmer into a wooded area in Knoxville, where they tortured and killed her. Pike was convicted of the murder and sentenced to death in 1996. PBS reported that it remains an open question whether Tennessee will attempt to execute Pike again. [7][12][14]