Christa Pike, 50, is conscious and able to speak while receiving hospital care after surviving Tennessee's attempted execution of her last week, her lawyers said Tuesday. Pike received two doses of pentobarbital during the September 30 attempt and was taken to a Nashville hospital, where she was unconscious for several days, reports said.
Her attorneys said Pike has severe injuries to her arms and remains handcuffed and shackled to her hospital bed. They said her prognosis remains unclear and that they expect a lengthy recovery, describing it as medically unprecedented. Pike was sentenced to death for the 1995 killing of classmate Colleen Slemmer, according to the BBC and Deutsche Welle. Her lawyers want her sentence commuted to life without parole, Deutsche Welle reported.