US inmate who survived failed execution discharged from hospital

Christa Pike appears in court in Nashville in April 2012. Photo: Dipti Vaidya/Imagn/Reuters

The US death row inmate who survived a failed lethal injection in Tennessee has been discharged from hospital and returned to prison, the Associated Press reports.

Christa Pike, 50, was transferred to the Debra K. Johnson Rehabilitation Centre, the women’s prison where she had been held for 30 years, her attorneys said in a statement on Saturday.

“She is grateful to the first responders and her medical team for their care in these extraordinary circumstances. She is continuing to receive medical care at the prison, and we will continue to track her recovery,” the statement said.

Pike had been hospitalised since September 30, when Tennessee officials attempted to execute her by lethal injection for the 1995 beating and stabbing death of her classmate, Colleen Slemmer.

She survived two doses of pentobarbital, the drug used in the execution. At one point, she was placed on a ventilator, and her attorneys feared she would not survive.

However, she later regained consciousness and began talking and walking with assistance.

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The Death Penalty Information Centre said Pike was the first known person to survive after receiving lethal injection drugs during an execution.

Tennessee officials have not explained what went wrong during the execution attempt. Medical and lethal injection experts have examined whether improperly placed intravenous lines prevented the drug from entering Pike’s bloodstream as intended.

In a court filing, Pike’s attorneys said “apparently, at no point did any member of the execution team realise that the IV lines were not correctly placed.”

The failed execution has prompted renewed scrutiny of Tennessee’s execution procedures.

Governor Bill Lee postponed the state’s only other scheduled execution this year and ordered a review of the incident, while the state’s prison chief resigned in its aftermath.

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