Christa Pike Is ‘Up and Walking’ But ‘Angry and Confused’ Following Botched Execution Attempt

Christa Pike is miraculously recovering in the hospital after surviving two botched lethal injections, according to her legal team.

“She is angry and confused about everything right now. She is very aware that the state tried to execute her,” the 50-year-old’s attorney Randall Spivey said on Wednesday, October 7, via Page Six.

Pike is also “up and walking for the first time today, but just around the room, not very far,” her lawyer Stephen Ferrell told BBC Radio’s 4 Today on October 7, though he had not yet spoken directly to his client.

As Globe previously reported, Pike — who was the only woman on death row and an inmate at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville, Tennessee — was administered two lethal injections on September 30.

Pike was taken to the hospital after it appeared the injections did not kill her. While she was initially declared unconscious and in critical condition, Ferrell said that by late Tuesday, October 6, she was doing “fairly well.”

Ferrell added that Pike was still experiencing after-effects of pentobarbital, the drug that was injected into her body by prison staff during the scheduled execution.

He added that “there’s quite a bit going on” with Pike physically, including that her arms “are very injured and she’s not able to use them very much.”

Pike is also exhibiting some memory problems. “I think it’s kind of good and bad,” her attorney told the BBC of her mental state. “Good that she is fairly with it, but she’s also somewhat foggy. She can lose her train of thought really easily and forgets where she’s going.”

It’s unclear what permanent damage, if any, Pike will have, per her attorney. Ferrell is pushing for Pike to receive psychological support, telling the outlet that was “necessary.”

Pike’s legal team has described her situation as an unprecedented outcome that has raised questions about what happens next.

They are now urging Tennessee Governor Bill Lee to downgrade her punishment to life in prison without parole. So far, Lee has ordered a freeze on all executions in the state for the remainder of 2026. The state’s prisons chief has also since resigned after Pike’s failed execution.

Pike was sentenced to death for murdering Colleen Slemmer with her then-boyfriend, Tadaryl Shipp, in 1995. She was 18 and Shipp was 17. Shipp, who is in prison, did not face the death penalty because he was not an adult at the time of the killing.