Christa Pike, who survived a failed execution attempt in Tennessee last month, said Friday that she has been in pain every moment since waking up confused at the hospital.
Pike said she entered the execution chamber after saying goodbye, adding: “I hadn’t considered life beyond that night.”
“A few days later, I woke up alone in a hospital, confused and in pain,” she said in a statement dictated to her lawyers. “There hasn’t been a moment since that night that I haven’t been in pain. My body hurts. My arms hurt. My hands hurt. My throat hurts. I still have trouble speaking. And the pain isn’t just physical. There’s pain in my mind and in my soul.”
His statement was made public exactly one month after he survived the attempted execution. This is the first public comment she has made since.
Pike, 50, was given two doses of a lethal injection drug, but her legal team confirmed shortly after the failed procedure that, in an unprecedented twist, she had been alive and had been hospitalized. One witness, a media representative, noted that he could be heard snoring loudly about an hour into the proceedings. She was then transported by ambulance to an area hospital.
Pike’s lawyers said earlier this month that she suffered from pneumonia, a blood clot, could not swallow and was unable to move her arms or hands once she regained consciousness in the hospital. One of Pike’s attorneys told reporters at a news conference that his hands “looked like a surgical glove.” However, she was able to start walking shortly after and was returned to the prison for further treatment on October 10.
“I don’t know why I survived that night. I don’t know what’s next,” Pike said in a statement Friday. “Some days finding hope is harder than others. For now, I’m trying to heal, one day at a time.”
Pike was convicted in 1995 of the brutal murder of her classmate, 19-year-old Colleen Slemmer. Court records show that Pike, then 18, tortured and killed Slemmer, cutting her with a meat cleaver and a box cutter for an hour in a wooded part of the University of Tennessee campus, with the help of her boyfriend and a friend.
Tennessee Department of Correction via AP 
Although other executions were halted, they usually involved difficulties in finding a vein for the lethal injection. Pike is the only person known to have survived an execution attempt in the United States, where the drug was administered, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.
It is believed that Pike’s veins may have ruptured before he was injected with pentobarbital, according to court documents cited by the Associated Press. The execution team used about 10 needles and tried multiple IV sites on both arms, his attorney said in the filing.
“I’m looking for meaning in what happened to me,” Pike said. “One thing that has given me strength is the extraordinary love and support I have received from people all over the world. I am overwhelmed by the kindness and prayers of people I have known for years and complete strangers who have never met me.”
Pike’s failed execution raised questions about lethal injection protocol in Tennessee. It was the second number this year in the state. Tony Carruthers could not be executed after members of the execution team spent more than an hour trying to establish an IV line for the lethal injection. The governor granted a one-year reprieve for his execution.
CBS News reviewed state lethal injection protocols dating back to 2007 and found that as the years went by, the protocols became increasingly vague.
It’s still unclear what will become of Pike, even a month after the botched execution. Gov. Bill Lee, who has suspended executions in the state until the end of the year, was asked Wednesday about Pike’s next steps.
“I suspect his sentence will be the same as before, unless the courts decide otherwise,” he told reporters at a news conference.
Pike’s lawyers successfully asked the court to preserve all evidence related to the botched execution during an Oct. 7 hearing. A follow-up hearing on Oct. 23 was canceled as the judge considers several motions in the case. Pike’s attorney, Steve Ferrell, urged the governor commute his sentence during an interview with “CBS Mornings” days after his botched execution.
“The least that can happen now is we at least take death off the table and start looking at what the future might be for her,” Ferrell, of the Federal Defense Services East Tennessee, told “CBS Mornings” Oct. 5.
A third of Americans support a second attempt to execute Pike, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted earlier this month.
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